"A GOOD LITTLE 'UN IS BETTER THAN A BAD BIG 'UN."
"110-Ton Guns do not count for any practical purpose.... These monsters are the laughing-stock of everyone who takes the smallest interest in the subject. They are quite indefensible, and not worth making, even if they were unobjectionable, for the simple reason that everything we require can be done by smaller weapons.... It is believed that more of these useless monsters are to be made by way of reserve. It is an insane policy, designed simply to save somebody's amour propre, and we still hope to hear from Lord GEORGE HAMILTON that it has been abandoned."—"The Times" on the Naval Estimates.
"That a good little 'un is better than a bad big 'un," is an old and accepted maxim amongst the really knowing ones of the P.R. It is one, however, that now, as of yore, swell backers, self-conceited amateurs, and other pugilistic jugginses ore apt to ignore or forget.
Where, we wonder, would the slab-sided "Sprawleybridge Babe" or the shambling "Baldnob the Titan" have been in front of the small but active and accomplished "Duodecimo Dumps"? Why, where the vaunted "Benicia Boy" would have been after fifty rounds with TOM SAYERS—with his "Auctioneer" in full play. In fact, when a good little 'un meets a bad big 'un, it is very soon a case—with the latter—of "bellows to mend," or "there he goes; with his eye out!"
These remarks have been suggested by recent revelations concerning that much over-rated pet of the mugs—the "Woolwich Whopper," alias the "Elswick Folly," alias HAMILTON's "Novice."
The "W.W." always was a fraud, and, for all his lumbering bulk and "MOLINEAUX-like" capacity of "tatur-trap," never could train-on soundly, or—figuratively speaking—"spank a hole in a pound of butter." Many cleverish trainers, and still more ambitious backers of the "Corinthian Jay" species, have had a shy, professionally or monetarily, at the "Woolwich Whopper," and invariably with disastrous results. The "W.W.," though big enough in all conscience, is not of sound constitution, nor of the true wear-and-tear sort, is very difficult (and expensive) to train, and when brought fairly up to the scratch is certain to go bang to pieces after the first few rounds, if these are at all of a hot-and-hot character.
Still there are—worse luck!—certain parties connected, more or less, with the P.R. who—whether from interest, vanity, or sheer cussedness, still pin their faith to this "huge, lumbering, soft, long-shanked, top-heavy, shambling, thump-shirking Son of a Gun," as NOBBY NUPKINS, of the Nautical Division, pithily called him the other day. If some of these credulous or conceited coves had witnessed the little trial "scrap" which took place recently (on the strict Q.T.), at the "Admiral's Head," in the presence of Mr. JOHN B-LL (the famous P.R. referee), between the vaunted "Whopper" and a smart and handy light-weight known as "Quickfire," their owl-eyes might, having been a little opened, and their peacock-strut a bit modified.