Because Mars looks spotty or misty,
Some dreamers, with intellects twisty,
Imagine, old horse,
Mars is playing at Morse!
All bosh! You ask Dyson or Christie.
Mr. Punch. Mr. Maunder "has you under his special charge," hasn't he?
Mars. Much obliged to Mr. Maunder, I'm sure! Wants to take my photo, doesn't he? As if I were a mere politician, a popular comedian, or 'Arriet at the seaside on a Bank Holiday!
Mr. Punch. Have you any Bank Holidays in your planet?
Mars. Thank Sol, Mr. Punch, we have outlived the epoch of taking our pleasure in spasms, like your cockney victims of the vulgar voluptuary's St. Vitus's dance!
Mr. Punch. Don't be uppish, old man! 'Tis an ill-bred age of Kodaks, and Interviews, and other phases of popular Paul Pryism. But you've had your ignominious moments, Mars. If a "snap-shot" could have been taken at you when held prostrate, chained, and captive, at the feet of Otus and Ephialtes, or, still worse, when caught with Venus in the iron net of Vulcan:—
All heaven beholds, imprison'd as they lie,
And unextinguish'd laughter shakes the sky.
Mars. Spare me, excellent Punch. Eugh! Thank heaven Olympus knew no Kodaks then, or "the gay Apollo" would yet longer have had the laugh of me.
Mr. Punch. Pardon me for awaking unpleasant memories! But even gods should not be bumptious, especially when, like the Second Mrs. Tanqueray, they "have a past."
Mars. Well, anyhow I've been able to baffle the camera-wielders up to now. My ruddy countenance and "bluish radiance" have beaten Greenwich, and even licked the Lick! As they themselves admit, "Mars up to the present has defied cameral detection."