In these years, and for a good many years to come, _Punch_ hunted in couples with _The Times_.
The neglect of native talent and the encouragement of foreign artists, musicians, men of letters, is harped upon in number after number for year after year. Here again the method is sometimes direct, sometimes oblique, as in the fictitious list of people invited to the Court: Dickens, Hood, Mrs. Somerville, and Maria Edgeworth. Another opportunity was when it was announced that the Danish Royal family had attended the funeral of Thorwaldsen in deep mourning, _Punch_ exclaims, "imagine for a moment English Royalty in deep mourning for departed genius!" The often-repeated visits of "General Tom Thumb" to Court in 1844 made him very angry. At the second "command" performance the General "personated Napoleon amid great mirth, and this was followed by a representation of Grecian statues, after which he danced a nautical hornpipe, and sang several of his favourite songs" in the presence, as _Punch_ notes, of the Queen of the Belgians, daughter of Louis Philippe. But _Punch_ had his revenge on this curious and deep-rooted interest of Royalty in dwarfs--Queen Isabella of Spain had one permanently attached to her staff--by indulging in a delightful speculation on the happy results that would have ensued if George IV, like General Tom Thumb, had stopped growing at the age of five months:--
How much we should have been spared had George IV only weighed 15 lbs. and stopped at 25 inches! How much would have been saved merely in tailors' bills, and how many pavilions for his dwarf majesty might have been built at a hundredth part of the cost that was swallowed by the royal folly at Brighton!
The Georges, it may be remarked, were no favourites of _Punch_, nor was this to be wondered at when one recalls their treatment at the hands of Thackeray, the least democratic member of the staff. _Punch_ considered that Brummell was a better man than his "fat friend," and consigned the latter to infamy in the following caustic epitaph, one of a series on the Four Georges:--
He left an example for age and for youth To avoid. He never acted well by Man or Woman, And was as false to his Mistress as to his Wife. He deserted his Friends and his Principles. He was so ignorant that he could scarcely spell; But he had some skill in cutting out Coats, And an undeniable Taste for Cookery. He built the Palaces of Brighton and of Buckingham, And for these Qualities and Proofs of Genius, An admiring Aristocracy Christened him the "First Gentleman in Europe." Friends, respect the KING whose Statue is here, And the generous Aristocracy who admired him.