Joseph Gillott’s Steel Pens
The Best Food for Infants
Is Prepared solely by
Savory and Moore
—a hint as likely to be taken as that of a public benefactor who announced in the Standard: ‘Incredible as it may seem, I have ground to hope that half a glass of cold water, taken immediately after every meal, will be found to be the divinely appointed antidote for every kind of medicine.’
Another benevolent individual kindly tells us how to make coffee:
Placed in the parted straining-top let stand
The moistened coffee, till the grain expand,
Before the fire; then boiling water pour,
And quaff the nectar of the Indian shore.
But he is not quite so generous as he seems, since he is careful to inform us he is in possession of an equally excellent recipe for bringing out the flavour of tea, which he will forward for five shillings-worth of stamps. Urged by an equally uncontrollable desire to serve his fellow-creatures, a ‘magister in palmystery and conditionalist’ offers, with the aid of guardian spirits, to obtain for any one a glimpse at the past and present; and, on certain conditions, of the future; but with less wisdom than a magister of palmystery should display, he winds up with the prosaic notification, ‘Boots and shoes made to order.’
The wants of the majority of advertisers are intelligible enough; but it needs some special knowledge to understand what may be meant by the good people who hanker for a portable mechanic, an efficient handwriter, a peerless feeder, a first-class ventilator on human hair-nets, a practical cutter by measure on ladies’ waists, a youth used to wriggling, and a boy to kick Gordon. Nor is the position required by a respectable young lady as ‘figure in a large establishment,’ altogether clear to our mind; and we may be doing injustice to the newspaper proprietor requiring ‘a sporting compositor,’ by inferring he wants a man clever alike at ‘tips’ and types.
It does not say much for American theatrical ‘combinations,’ that the managers of one of them ostentatiously proclaim: ‘We pay our salaries regularly every Tuesday; by so doing, we avoid lawsuits, are not compelled to constantly change our people, and always carry our watches in our pockets.’ Neither would America appear to be quite such a land of liberty as it is supposed to be, since a gentleman advertises his want of a furnished room where he can have perfect independence; while we have native testimony to our cousins’ curiosity in a quiet young lady desiring a handsome furnished apartment ‘with non-inquisitive parties;’ and a married couple seeking three or four furnished rooms ‘for very light housekeeping, where people are not inquisitive.’ Can it be the same pair who want a competent Protestant girl ‘to take entire charge of a bottled baby?’ If so, their anxiety to abide with non-curious folk is easily comprehended.