Genre:

Regular Feature—Poetry; Proceedings, Drollery

Subjects:

Government, Politics, Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, Disease, Railways, Transport, Commerce, Charlatanry, Class, Hospitals, Mental Illness

    Begins with a poem based on Queen Victoria's recent speech on the state opening of the Houses of Parliament. This notes Britain's successful campaigns against the Indian famine and the cattle plague, and points out that 'Insolvent Railways' and 'the London sick and other poor' look to Parliament 'for cure'. (63) Moving to its usual summary of parliamentary proceedings, notes Gathorne Gathorne-Hardy's 'Sick Poor Bill' which proposes assistance to London 'pauper lunatics, very young children, and sick', by building new hospitals and asylums.