Pity a Whitechapel Tar!
Toast and Water.—A Toast proposed at a Temperance Meeting.
GREAT JEW MEETING.
On Saturday evening last, a large and influential meeting of members of the Hebrew nation assembled in the Synagogue, Great Saint Helen's, for the purpose of taking into consideration the recent article in Punch, in which that illustrious individual, remarking upon the fact that Jews were somehow or other mixed up in most cases of fraud, chicanery and imposture, strongly counselled the respectable and wealthy portion of the community to take such measures, as might tend to destroy an argument especially useful to those whose bigotry resisted the admission of the Jew Englishman to the civil rights of a Christian Englishman.
Among those who were present we noticed Baron Ingots, Sir Aaron Montechristo, Mr. Alderman Fitzdavid, the Rev. Rabbi Haphtorah, Professors Bereshith and Bara, and others, as representatives of the higher classes; and Messrs. Abrahams, Isaacs, Jacobs, Ikey, Barney, Clo, O. Clo, Behemoth, Gonoff, Shobbus, Fence, Sheeney, Tango, &c. &c. on the other interest. The former class had not deemed it desirable to bring the ladies of their families, but in the body of the meeting we remarked Mrs. and Miss Ikey, Mrs. Behemoth, Mrs. and the Misses Shobbus (11), Mrs. and Miss Sharon, Mrs. Tusks, and other distinguished Mosaic ornaments of private life.
Mr. Alderman Fitzdavid was voted into the chair, and a disposition to disturbance among the less select part of the meeting was speedily suppressed by the worthy Alderman reminding them, in a firm but good-humoured tone, that "he happened to be a magistrate." A young gentleman in the crowd appeared to take this remark as personal, and left the meeting somewhat abruptly, immediately after which it was noticed that Mrs. Sharon was compelled to borrow her daughter's pocket-handkerchief.
Mr. Alderman Fitzdavid then read the article from Punch, and said that the Hebrews were deeply indebted to that periodical. It had never shrunk from fighting their battles, or from pointing out their errors, and he was convinced that no right-minded Jew could mistake Mr. Punch's meaning or mistrust his goodwill. There was no doubt that the great mass of the Jews in England worshipped gold with a devotion which made them blind to better things.
A Voice. Vot's better, my dear, ceptin' dimonds; eh, vot.