GRICE E TERZI

 Michael John Barry was another who at this time (1857) shed no little brilliancy on Punch; and to him is now credited the admirable "Peccavi" despatch—perhaps the most finished and pointed that ever appeared in Punch's pages, and certainly one of the most highly appreciated and most loudly applauded:—  "'Peccavi! I've Scinde,' said Lord Ellen[44] so proud— Dalhousie, more modest, said 'Vovi, I've Oude!'" This brilliant couplet, according to the "Times," is said to have been contended for by "both Punch and Thomas Hood;" and it never was finally decided which of the two great humorists followed the other. Their claims, indeed, are not irreconcilable. Latterly, the credit has been claimed, with some show of authority, for Barry, who was generally regarded in his day as one of Jerrold's peers in wit. It is curious to observe that in the House of Commons debate on the Candahar question, Mr. P. J. Smyth was reported to have referred to "the unexampled brevity of the General's despatch after he had won his great victory on the Indus," in the quaint belief that the first half-line of the epigram was Lord Ellenborough's actual report.