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                            PUNCH AND JUDY,

                           With Instructions
                        How to Manage the Little
                             WOODEN ACTORS;

                               CONTAINING
                         New and Easy Dialogues
                        ARRANGED FOR THE USE OF
                      BEGINNERS, DESIROUS TO LEARN
                        HOW TO WORK THE PUPPETS.

                                --FOR--

             Sunday Schools, Private Parties, Festivals and
                         Parlor Entertainments.

                          BY THOS. A. M. WARD,
                            Attorney at Law.

                           JANESVILLE, WIS.:
                      VEEDER & LEONARD, PRINTERS,
                                 1874.




     Entered according to an Act of Congress, in the year 1874, by
                           THOS. A. M. WARD,
    In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Eastern District
                            of Pennsylvania.




                                PREFACE.


The Invention of Puppet Shows, Tumbling and other public amusements,
carries us back to a period in history long anterior to the birth of
MOSES.

In fact, Games of Chance, as well as the sports and pastimes usually
enjoyed in their Plays, by the early people of Egypt, were in their
zenith in the reign of the RAMESES.

RAMESES the II. was a magnificent patron of letters as well as art.

The "Sacred Library," which Diodorus mentions, has been discovered in
his Palace, the Rameseum at Karnak.

Nine men of learning were attached to the person of this King, and at
their head was a certain KAGABU, as "Master of the Rolls," (Books) a man
"unrivaled in elegance of style and diction."

From the pen of this master, who may have helped to train the mind of
MOSES, the King's adopted grandson, in "all the learning of the
Egyptians," we still possess the oldest Fairy Tale in the world, a moral
story, resembling that of Joseph and his Brethren, composed for the
King's son Meneptha, who afterwards became the opponent of Moses, at the
time of the exodus of the Jews from Egypt.

Our object is not so much with the antiquity of shows, as it is directly
with the introduction of "PUNCH AND JUDY" into polite society; in proper
character, free from superfluous verbiage, and dressing the play in
phraseology commensurate with the progress of the age--good taste and
refinement.

The performance of PUNCH in the streets of European cities, unpurified
of the vulgar colloquies put into his mouth, by the man who works the
Puppets, would not for an instant be tolerated by the people of this
country.

"The Play of PUNCH AND JUDY," observes a writer in _Harper's Monthly_,
"was exhibited for a short time at a popular place of amusement in New
York City, in 1870, but did not take sufficiently with the audience to
induce the managers to go on with it."

The true cause of its failure, at the time, doubtless arose from the
vulgar and impure language, used by the fellow that worked the Figures.

Where the little Puppets have been properly conducted, the popularity of
the show has been unbounded.

With the assistance of Mr. Cruikshank's admirable illustrations, it may
be made the medium of the most amusing whimsicalities. We are told that
so grave and dignified a personage as an English Secretary of State is
certain to be, once paused on his way from Downing street to the HOUSE
OF COMMONS on a night of important debate to witness the whole
performance.




                             INSTRUCTIONS.

                      How to Perform the Puppets.


The Frame should be three feet long and two feet wide: there should
be a space of 16 inches high, between the stage, on which the Puppets
perform, and the top of the Frame, corresponding to the ceiling of
a room, from which a little curtain hangs and in all particulars
resembling a miniature theatre, with small wings on the sides, like the
scenes in a large theatre, and a curtain in front to drop, or slide
across the stage, at the end of each act, is necessary. Immediately
above the stage is a small stick running across the top, from which a
small fringe hangs, in the style of a curtain, between this fringe and
the top of the stage, is a space of 16 inches, for the Puppets to
perform.

The hight of the stage, or floor on which the Puppets move, from the
ground upward, must be regulated by the hight of the person performing
the Figures: the stage, therefore, should never exceed two inches higher
than the head of the person who stands behind it, inside of the Frame.
This will enable