The “Editor’s Table” in The Knickerbocker is full of well, this and that. Lots of editorializing, some jokes, correspondence (including from contributors), reviews of other magazines… and it is so densely printed it is really hard to read. When you go read a Knickerbocker (like this one, perhaps?), be sure to enlarge your font. Your eyes will thank you.1
One of the other magazines they read (and report on) frequently is Punch, or the London Charivari, usually to laugh at its jokes. For instance, from the February 1844 “Editor’s Table”:
Punch’s ‘Literary Intelligence’ is very full. From it we gather that the author of the ‘Mothers,’ ‘Wives,’ ‘Maids,’ and ‘Daughters’ of England has another work in press, entitled ‘The Grandmothers of England.’ ‘No grandmother’s education will be complete till she has read and re-read ‘The Grandmothers of England.’ The book is the very best guide to oval suction extant.’
I’m wondering, though, why do grandmothers know how to suck eggs? Do you have to be a grandmother to do it?
- Too bad for the original readers — they didn’t have the same opportunity to spare their sight and had to read the tiny (Agate?) print by candlelight.[back]