A Pack of Knaves, or A "Packed" meeting of the "Knowing Cards" of the Betting-Shop interest to consider & adopt the best Shuffling Tricks to carry on their Game! A humble attempt in the "Pre Raphael" Style by George Cruikshank.
MYSTERIES OF PARIS,
Totally Unexplained, by a Regular Briton.
In the first place, I should like to know what they mean by wearing those enormous fur hats? They may be an intelligent people. All I know is—I never saw such a set of muffs as they look in all my life. And such tight trousers! reducing the legs of Young France to next to nothing, and presenting an appearance of top-heaviness that is absolutely uncomfortable to contemplate. They talk of their stable government! The heads of the nation could never have been in a more tottering condition than they seem now—and I don't see how things can possibly go on long on such a slender footing.
Why should such a difference exist between the civil and military states? I have heard a great deal of the admirable discipline of the French army; but in a great many regiments there appears to be no recognisable head worth speaking of. Quite the contrary. Are we indeed to believe the scandal that all the boasted cares and energies of the saviours of France have only been directed to the basest ends?
This is the baker! The circular article he holds in his right hand is a loaf! So is the longitudinal ditto in his left! I am at a loss to account for the singular expedients resorted to by the French for making their bread. It is true that one species possesses the great recommendation, to the heads of families, of going a very long way. But, on the contrary, the other is a description of food which the smallest child could get through in no time.
This gentleman is supposed to be conducting himself in this remarkable manner from an excess of enjoyment and high spirits; the French, generally, being supposed to be a gay and light-hearted people. Does a close inspection of the expression of the gentleman's countenance, in the height of his hilarity, warrant either supposition? Would it not rather be thought that he is performing a terrible act of penance for some sin that can never be wholly expiated?
