N.B. Season with perspective christening and postponed epitaph.
A STARTLING ROMANCE.
Take a small boy, charity, factory, carpenter’s apprentice, or otherwise, as occasion may serve—stew him well down in vice—garnish largely with oaths and flash songs—boil him in a cauldron of crime and improbabilities. Season equally with good and bad qualities—infuse petty larceny, affection, benevolence, and burglary, honour and housebreaking, amiability and arson—boil all gently. Stew down a mad mother—a gang of robbers—several pistols—a bloody knife. Serve up with a couple of murders—and season with a hanging-match.
N.B. Alter the ingredients to a beadle and a workhouse—the scenes may be the same, but the whole flavour of vice will be lost, and the boy will turn out a perfect pattern.—Strongly recommended for weak stomachs.
AN HISTORICAL DITTO.
Take a young man six feet high—mix up with a horse—draw a squire from his father’s estate (the broad-shouldered and loquacious are the best sort)—prepare both for potting (that is, exporting). When abroad, introduce a well-pounded Saracen—a foreign princess—stew down a couple of dwarfs and a conquered giant—fill two sauce-tureens with a prodigious ransom. Garnish with garlands and dead Turks. Serve up with a royal marriage and cloth of gold.
A NARRATIVE.
Take a distant village—follow with high-road—introduce and boil down pedlar, gut his pack, and cut his throat—hang him up by the heels—when enough, let his brother cut him down—get both into a stew—pepper the real murderer—grill the innocent for a short time—then take them off, and put delinquents in their place (these can scarcely be broiled too much, and a strong fire is particularly recommended). When real perpetrators are done, all is complete.
If the parties have been poor, serve up with mint sauce, and the name of the enriched sufferer.