Page:Punch and judy.djvu/36

 (26) CHAPTER III.

ARRIVAL OF PUNCH IN ENGLAND.

now come to a point of great national importance—when Punch made his début, or first appearance, in England. Great events are usually recorded on the page of history, but this is one, that, by some strange fatality, has escaped all notice; and, after the lapse of more than a century, we have been called upon to examine forgotten records, and to furnish detailed information. The documents in the State Paper Office, the Records in the Tower, the Rolls of Parliament, and the MSS. in the British Museum, and in the Libraries of the Universities, we are sorry to observe, have supplied us with no intelligence regarding Mr. Punch, Mrs. Judy, or any other member of his family. We have also patiently gone through Evelyn's and Pepys's Diaries, with many other works of the same kind, in print and out of print; but though they dwell on the Fire of London, the Plague, declarations of war, treaties of peace, the reception of ambassadors, and other historical trifles of that sort, they are silent regarding the arrival of this illustrious foreigner.

Dr. Drake, (and a great many writers before him, for he seldom runs the risk of advancing a novelty,) has called the reign of Queen Anne "the Augustan Age of Literature" in England. Its claim to this proud distinction has been disputed, and certain admirers of old prose and poetry have set up the reign of Elizabeth in opposition to it. Now, although non nostrum tantas componere lites, if we can clearly establish, that the