"To Property Owners and Hotel Proprietors.—Start Redecorating and Repairs now, before the rush comes, and gives the boys returning a chance for work."—Provincial Paper.
Personally, we shall postpone our order until the boys do come home.
Artist. "I CAN'T AFFORD TEN POUNDS. MY BANK TELLS ME I'M OVERDRAWN NOW."
His Wife. "SURELY YOU CAN GET IT AT ANOTHER BANK? THEY CAN'T ALL BE AS HARD UP AS THAT."
A CONSPIRACY IN THE POULTRY-YARD.
DEAR MR. PUNCH,—I suppose it must be conceded that practical jokes have not the vogue that they once enjoyed. No longer do you discover some fine morning that the street in which you live is blockaded with furniture vans, all endeavouring to deliver furniture you don't require and never heard of before, while your staircase is a mass of flowers and fruit constantly increasing upon you and threatening to smother you with their amount no less than with their scent. It would gradually appear that the deliveries both of the flowers and the furniture were being executed in accordance with the orders of one of your friends, and that you had to grin and bear it as best you might. I cannot say that the victim or the general public, when they heard of it, looked upon it with any excess of enthusiasm. Anyhow, practical jokes have gone out.
Yet there is a kind of practical joke which, so far as I know, has never been played upon anybody, and which, if it wore played, might provoke a considerable volume of laughter and no small inconvenience. I have schemed it out and venture to submit the plan to you.
My idea is to take some weekly magazine which caters either for some special trade or amusement or pursuit. Let us imagine it to be The Chicken Run, with which is incorporated The Fowls' Guardian. I am entitled to assume that most of Mr. Punch's readers are acquainted with this bright and lively feathered journal. My plan is to get together some bold spirits, to capture the editor and his staff, and to hold them in a comfortable but rigorous imprisonment for one week; to take possession of the editorial office, and then to set to work to transform the contents of the paper. I foresee the amazement of the faithful readers of The Chicken Run, on being informed, in the column headed "Hints to Beginners," that Mr. LLOYD GEORGE'S pet Leghorn cockerel has developed a surprising taste for latchkeys, and recently swallowed two of them, while Mr. ASQUITH'S Buff Orpington pullet has taken to following him about like a dog and roosting on his bed-rail. Then there would be a breezy editorial article designed to prove that poultry had come out of the war with a much enhanced reputation, owing to the loyal part they had played in assisting the FOOD-CONTROLLER.
Further, there would be special articles proving, for instance, that champagne is the one drink on which all breeds of chickens increase and multiply their production of eggs, especially if hot caviare is afterwards administered in large bowls. Then there would be the first chapters of an enthralling serial whose plot revolved round the love-story of Sir Robert Wyandotte and Lady Cecilia Buttercup—a literary effort of unparalleled brilliancy due to the genius of a new novelist who preferred to be known as the Red Rover of Rhode Island. And so on and so on. If you think the scheme is feasible, let me hear from you and I will begin to get my team of villains together.
Yours faithfully,
THE GAME CHICK.