men in buckram;
while Mordan acquaints us, with much point, how many varieties he has
invented of pencil-cases and toothpicks. As to the London Wine
Company, the new art has long imprinted upon our minds a mysterious
notion of a series of vaults in the style of the Thames tunnel,
frequented by figures armed with spigots and dark lanterns, that
remind us of Guy Fawkes, and make us tremble for ourselves and Father
Mathew! Loose notions of the stay-making trade have been circulated by
the same medium; and we have noticed wood-blocks of wig-blocks,
deservedly immortalizing the pernquier.
But consider what it will be when the system is adopted on a more
comprehensive scale. The daily papers will present a series of
designs, remarkable as those of the Glyptothek and Pinacothek at
Munich; and in all probability, the artists of the prize cartoons will
be engaged in behalf of the leading journals of Europe. Who cannot
foresee her Majesty's drawing-room illustrated by Parris! Who cannot
conceive the invasion of Britain outdone in an allegorical leading
article: "Louis Philippe (in a Snooks-like attitude) inviting Queen
Victoria to St Cloud; and the British lion lashing out its tail at the
Coq Gaulois!"
As to the affairs of Spain, they will be a mine of wealth to the new
press--_L'Espagne Pittoresque_ will sell thousands more copies than
Spain Constitutionalized; and let us trust that Sir George Hayter will
instantly "walk his chalks," and secure us the Cortes in black and
white.
The Greek character will now become easy to decipher; and the evening
papers may take King Otho both off the throne and on. The designs of
Russia have long been proverbial; but the exercise of the new art of
printing may assign them new features. The representations of
impartial periodicals will cut out, or out-cut De Custine; and while
contemplating the well-favoured presentment of Nicholas I., we shall
exclaim--"Is this a tyrant that I see before me?" Nothing will be
easier then to throw the Poles into the shade of the picture, or to
occupy the foreground with a brilliant review.
As to Germany, to embody her in the hieroglyphics of the new press,
might be a study for Retsch; and who will care for the lumbering pages
of Von Raumer, or the wishy-washy details of Kohl, when able, in an
_augenblick_, to bring Berlin and Vienna before him; to study the
Zollverein in the copy of the King of Prussia's cogitative
countenance, and ascertain the views
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