CARICATURE HISTORY OF THE GEORGES. oa. M* -maoie j ft,,,,/ a d rru vAan yovwSf ewe^ ^j^nfr-y ^ / t, 0>n .,,/,/ /,., ' -d It < -utHi d If ont. of (fit GEORGK 111, AND BON APART?: 'X v ' / ''/>> // -tV//y/y "/ / J }r> f-r/ff/iff ,' / ' ,V///// ''<'' CARICATURE HISTORY OF THE GEORGES. OR, ANNALS OF THE HOUSE OF HANOVER, COMPILED FROM THE SQUIBS, BROADSIDES, WINDOW PICTURES, LAMPOONS, AND PICTORIAL CARICATURES OF THE TIME. BY THOMAS WRIGHT, ESQ., F.S.A. A Brandy Drinker. WITH NEARLY FOUR HUNDRED ILLUSTRATIONS ON STEEL AND WOOD. LONDON: JOffN CAMDEN HOTTEN, PICCADILLY. [All rights reserved.} LARGE PAPER EDITION. A LIMITED NUMBER PRINTED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY, College Library D, & PREFACE. TJS application of song, and satire, and picture to politics, is a thing of no modern date ; for we trace it more or less among every people with whose history we have much ac- quaintance. Caricatures have been found in Egyptian tombs. The song and the lampoon were the constant attendants on, and incentives in, those incessant political struggles which, during the middle ages, were preparing for the formation of modern society ; and many an old manuscript and sculptured block, whether of wood or stone, show that our forefathers in those times understood well the permanent force of pictorial satire. But it is more especially in religious matters that the middle ages, like antiquity, have shown a full perception of the importance of appealing through the eye to the hearts of the masses. In the rapid and temporary movements of political strife, this weapon could not be adopted with much effect until after the invention of printing, when, by a quick process, pic- tures engraved could be multiplied indefinitely. It was in the latter part of the sixteenth, and especially during the seven- teenth century, that engraved caricatures became a very for- midable instrument in working upon the feelings of the popu- lace. Songs and lampoons, which every tongue could assist in circulating, have never ceased to show themselves in great abundance during every political movement since the period when the small amount of historical information which time has left us, allows us first to trace them ; and they, as well as caricatures, have been by far too much neglected as historical vi PREFACE. documents, for in them, perhaps, alone can we hope to trace many of the real motives which caused or exerted an influence over all the great popular revolutions of the past. In the wish to show the utility of such records, by illustrat- ing a given period of modern history from materials entirely derived from these sources, originated the following picture of the reigns of the first three Georges. It is to us an interest- ing period, because in it arose all those distinctions of political parties, and that peculiar spirit of constitutional antagonism, which exist at the present day. With it most of the poli- tical questions now in dispute took their rise. It consists in itself of two periods ; the first, that in which the House of Brunswick was established on the throne of England upon the ruin of Jacobitism, and by the overthrow of the political creed of despotism ; the second, that in which the same dynasty and its throne were defended against the encroachments of that fearful flood of republicanism which burst out from a neigh- bouring kingdom, and when they thus gained a victory over democracy. During these periods both the great political parties in this country came into play ; in the first, the consti- tution owed its salvation to the Whigs ; in the second, it was in all probability saved, perhaps not altogether designedly, by the Tories. It may be necessary to state that in the present work the political colour of the history has been generally given more or less as represented in the class of materials on which it is founded. This was the period during which political caricatures flourished in England when they were not mere pictures to amuse and excite a laugh, but when they were made extensively subservient to the political warfare that was going on. This use of them seems to have been imported from Holland, and to have first come into extensive practice after the revolution of 1688. Before that time, the art of engraving had not made sufficient progress in this country to allow them to be produced with much effect. The older caricatures, those, for instance, upon Cromwell, were chiefly executed by Dutch artists ; and even in the great inundation of caricatures occasioned by the South- Sea bubble, the majority of them came from Holland. It was PREFACE. vii a defect of the earlier productions of this class, that they par- took more of an emblematical character than of what we now understand by the term caricature. Even Hogarth, when he turned his hand to politics, could not shake off the old prejudice on this subject, and it would be difficult to point out worse examples than the two celebrated publications which drew upon him so much popular odium, " The Times." Modern ca- ricature took its form from the pencils of a number of clever amateur artists, who were actively engaged in the political in- trigues of the reign of George II. ; it became a rage during the first years of his successor ; and then seemed to be dying away, to revive suddenly in the splendid conceptions of Gillray. This able artist was certainly the first caricaturist of our country ; during his long career, he produced a series of prints which form a complete history of the age. The Work now laid before the public is necessarily but a sketch ; only the more prominent points of the history of a hundred years are seized upon, and put forward in relief. The plan adopted has been to use caricatures and satires in the same manner that other historical illustrations are commonly used, by extracting from them the point, or at least a point, which bears more particularly or directly on the subject under con- sideration ; thus a few figures are taken from a caricature, or a few lines from a song. Some of the more remarkable carica- tures have been given entire, on separate plates. The idea, it is believed, is new, and I had to contend with the difficulties of labouring in so extensive a field, where nobody had previously cleared the way. These difficulties were, indeed, much greater than I foresaw, for no public collections of caricatures, or of political tracts or papers, exist. The poverty of our great national establishment, the British Museum, in works of this class, is deplorable. As far as regards caricatures, 1 had fortu nately obtained access to several very extensive private collec. tions. Unfortunately, no one, as far as I have been able to dis- cover, has made any considerable collection of political songs, satires, and other such tracts, published during the last century and the present. This is a circumstance much to be regretted, for it is a class of popular literature which is rapidly perishing, viii PREFACE. although the time is not yet past when such a collection might be made with considerable success. In conclusion, I will merely add, that I have had to deal with a class of literature which is always more coarse than any other, and during a period which was celebrated for anything rather than for delicacy. I have steered clear of this evil as carefully as I could without infringing on the truth of the picture of manners and sentiments which this book is intended to repre- sent. For a similar reason I have avoided entering upon the religious disputes, which were productive of much caricature and satire ; but when caricature is applied to such subjects, it seldom escapes the blot of being more or less profane. So far I had written as a preface to the first edition of this book, which appeared in 1843. I have only to add that, for this new edition, I have carefully revised the whole, and that I have made corrections where they seemed to be called for. It is further to be remarked that the title of this book having been originally tt England under the House of Hanover," it has been judged desirable, for several reasons, to change it in the second edition to that which it now bears which, in fact, describes it to the general reader more intelligibly, as well as more correctly ; for it is, strictly speaking, the History, by Caricature and Poli- tical Satire, of the Reigns of the Three Georges. THOMAS WEIGHT. Sydney-sired, Brompton, jDec.1807. CONTENTS. CHAPTER L GEORGE I. STATE OF PARTIES AT THE END OF QUEEN ANNE'S REIGN HIGH-CHURCH AKD DR. SACI1EVERELL ACCESSION OF GEORGE I. POLITICAL SQUIBS THAT FOLLOWED ATTACKS UPON THE EX-MIMSTERS ROBERT, THE POLITICAL JUGGLER AGITATIONS AT THE ELECTIONS JACOBITISH POPULARITY OF THE DUKE OF ORMOND CARICATURES OF THE PRETENDER JACOBITE RIOTS AND THE RIOT ACT FAILURE OF THE REBELLION AND EXULTATION OF THE WHIGS HISTORY OF THE LONDON JACOBITE MOB THE KING'S DEPASTURE FOB HANOVER . . pp. 134 CHAPTER IL GEORGE I. PARTY FEELING AFTER THE REBELLION PREVALENCE OF HIGHWAY ROBBERY THE MOB BISHOP HOADLY'S SERMON, AND COLLEY GIBBER'S " NON- JUROR" THE FRENCH MISSISSIPPI SCHEME THE SOUTH SEA BUBBLE SUDDEN MULTIPLICATION OF STOCK- JOBBING BUBBLES FALL OF THE " PAPER KING " LAW THE SOUTH-SEA BALLAD SOUTH-SEA CARICATURES BUBBLE CARDS, AND STOCK-JOBBING CARDS KNIGHT AND THE " SCREEN " ELECTIONS FOR A NEW PARLIAMENT NEW EFFORTS IN FAVOUR OF THE fBXTBNDEB BISHOP ATTEBBUHY'S PLOT pp. 85 64 CHAPTER III. OKOBOE I. AND II. LITERATURE DEBASED BY THE RAGE FOR POLITICS THE STAGE OPERAS, MASQUERADES, AND PANTOMIMES HEIDEGGER AND HIS SINGERS ORATOR HENLEY "THE BEGGARS' OPERA*' "THE DUNCIAD " CONTINUED POPU- LARITY OF THE OPERA POLITICAL USE OF THE STAGE ACT FOB LICENS- ING FLAYS ATTACKS UPON POPE NEW EDITION OF TUB " DUNCIAD. '' pp. 6693 x CONTENTS. CHAPTER IV. OEORGB II. IR ROBERT WALPOLE'S ADMINISTRATION PULTENET, BOLINGBROKK, AND THB " PATRIOTS " ACCESSION OF GEORGE n THE CONGRESS OF SOISSONS PROSECUTION OP THE " CRAFTSMAN " THE EXCISE INCREASING ATTACKS UPON WALPOLE VIOLENCE TS THE ELECTIONS THE GIN ACT THE PRINCE OF WALES LEADS THE OPPOSITION FOREIGN POLICY ; WALPOLE AND CARDI- NAL FLEURY RENEWED ATTACKS UPON WALPOLE, AND DIMINUTION OF THE MINISTERIAL MAJORITIES THE "MOTION," AND ITS CONSEQUENCES THE QUEEN OF HUNGARY WALPOLE IN THE MINORITY, AND CONSEQUENT RESIGNATION THE COMMITTEE OF INQUIRY ... pp. 94 142 CHAPTER V. GEORGE II. MINISTERIAL CHANGES AND PROMOTIONS UNPOPULARITY OF LORD BATH- BATTLE OF DETTINGEN NEW CHANGES, AND THE " BROAD-BOTTOM " THE REBELLION OF '45, AND ITS EFFECTS THE CITY TRAINED BANDS THE BDTCHEB THE WESTMINSTER ELECTIONS NEW CHANGES IN THE MINISTRY CONGRESS AND PEACE OF AIX-LA-CHAPELLE THE HOSTAGES NEW MINISTERIAL QUARRELS" CONSTITUTIONAL QUERIES " DEATH OF THE PRINCE OF WALES PP. 143 177 CHAPTER VI. GEORGE II. CHANGES IN THE ADMINISTRATION, AND INCIPIENT OPPOSITION OLD INTEREST AND NEW INTEREST ELIZABETH CANNING THE BILL FOB THE NATU- RALISATION OF THE JEWS ELECTIONS ; HOGARTH'S PRINTS DEATH OF MB. PELHAM, AND CONSEQUENT CHANGES IN THE MINISTRY WAR WITH FRANCE TRIAL OF ADMIRAL BYNG NEW CONVULSION IN THE MINISTRY, AND AC- CESSION OF WILLIAM PITT TO POWER THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR POPULAR DISCONTENT ; BEER VCTSUS GIN CONQUEST OF CANADA DEATH OF GEORGE THE SECOND .......... PP- 178216 CHAPTER VIL GEORGE II. AND III. PROGRESS OF LITERATURE: MAGAZINES AND REVIEWS; DR. HItX THE REIGJI OF PERTNESS PREVALENCE OF QUACKEBY AND CREDULITY: THE BOTTLB CONTENTS. xi CONJUROR; THE EARTHQUAKE; THE COCK LANE GHOST THE STAGE AND THE OPERA; GARHICK AND QUIN ; HANDEL; FOOTE INFLUENCE OF FRENCH FASHIONS; NATIONAL EXTRAVAGANCE, AND SOCIAL CONDITION EXAGGE- RATED FASHIONS IN COSTUME : HOOP-PETTICOATS AND GREAT HEAD- DRESSES: THE MACCAROMS NEGLECT OF LITERATURE, AND QUARRELS OF AUTHORS : HOGARTH AND CHURCHILL ; SMOLLETT ; JOHNSON ; CHATTER- TON ...pp. 216 274 CHAPTER VIII. GEORGE III. ACCESSION OF GEORGE HI BREAKING UP OF THE PITT MINISTRY RISE OF LORD BUTE, AND INUNDATION OF SCOTCHMEN THE PEACE BUTE'S RE- SIGNATION "WILKES AND LIBERTY;" THE MOB THE NORTH BRITON, AND THE "ESSAY ON WOMAN" ATTEMPT TO TAX THE AMERICANS THE ROCKINGHAM MINISTRY PITT'S RE-APPEARANCE, AND TEMPORARY RESTO- RATION TO POWER AS EARL OF CHATHAM OUTLAWRY OF WILKES ; THE PILLORY BUTE'S SECRET INFLUENCE ; HIS PUPPETS WILKES AT BRENT- FORD, AND IN THE KING'S BENCH WILKES LORD MAYOR OF LONDON, AND BIS SUBSEQUENT HISTORY pp. 275 316 CHAPTER IX. GEORGE III. VIOLENT POLITICAL AGITATION THE NORTH ADMINISTRATION THE FOXES REMONSTRANCES AND PETITIONS THE BUTTON-MAKER LIBERTY OF THE PRESS CARICATURES ON THE AMERICAN WAR ADMIRAL KEPPEL WAR WITH FRANCS AND SPAIN NO POPERY; THE LONDON RIOTS ATTACKS ON THE EARL OF SANDWICH AND ON LORD NORTH ; THE POLITICAL WASHER- WOMAN OVERTHROW OF LORD NORTH'S MINISTRY RODNEY'S TRIUMPHS ROCKINGIIAM AND 8UELBURNE ADMINISTRATIONS AMERICA pp. 316 362 CHAPTER X. GEORGE III. OVERTHROW OF LORD SIIELBURNE THE COALITION ATTACKS ON THE COALI- TION FOX'S INDIA BILL CARLO KUAN BACK-ST.uitS INFLUENCE THE 1NTKKFEHENCE OF THE KING, AND DISMISSAL OF THE MINISTRY QUARREL BETWEEN THE CROWN AND THE HOUSE OF COMMONS WILLIAM PITT PRIME CONTEXTS. MINISTER THE OPPOSITION IN MAJORITY IN THE HOUSE; DISSOLUTION OF PARLIAMENT THE WESTMINSTER ELECTION THE DUCHESS OF DEVON- SHIRE CARICATURES AND SQUIBS AGAINST THE DEFEATED COALITIONISTS pp. 363 401 CHAPTER XT. GEORGE III. LOW STATE OF THE OPPOSITION CARICATURES AGAINST FOX AND HIS COL- LEAGUES THE PROBATIONARY ODES IRELAND; GRATTAN AND FLOOD THE FORTIFICATION SCHEME INDIA ; WARREN HASTINGS ; THE IMPEACH- MENT THE PRINCE OF WALES; ROTAL PARSIMONY AND ROYAL EXTRAVA- GANCE THE TRIAL OF WARREN HASTINGS MINISTERIAL CORRUPTION ; ANTIPATHY OF PARTIES ; THE INSTALLATION SUPPER FIRST INDISPOSITION OF THE KING: THE REGENCY BILL pp. 402 137 CHAPTER XII. GEORGE in. THE FRENCH REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD EFFECT OF THE REVOLUTION IN ENG- LAND DESERTION FROM THE LIBERAL PARTY IN PARLIAMENT ; BURKE's PHILIPPICS REVOLUTIONARY SYMPATHY IN ENGLAND ; DR. PRICE, DR. PRIESTLEY, AND THOMAS PAINE ANTI-GALLICAN AGITATION SATIRES ON THE KING AND QUEEN AGITATION THROUGHOUT THE COUNTRY, AND GOVERNMENT MEASURES AFFECTING THE LIBERTY OF THE SUBJECT FOREIGN POLICY; WAR- WITH FRANCE pp. 438 489 CHAPTER GEORGE III. CLAMOURS FOR PEACE MARRIAGE OF THE PRINCE OF WALES POPULAR SUB- JECTS OF COMPLAINT; TAXES AND REFORM INSULT UPON THE KING BILL AGAINST SEDITIOUS MEETINGS GREAT MEETING IN COPENHAGEN-FIELDS UNSUCCESSFUL NEGOTIATIONS FOR PEACE NEW AGITATION AGAINST FRANCE AND REPUBLICANISM WINE AND DOG TAX THREATENED INVASION IRISH REBELLION NAVAL VICTORIES ; BATTLE OF THE NILE UNION WITH IRELAND BUONAPARTE FIRST CONSUL . pp. 490 532 CONTENTS. u CHAPTER XIV. GEORGE III. SOCIETY DURING THE LATTER PART OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY COSTUME ; EXTRAVAGANCE OF FASHIONS THE BALLOON MANIA GAMBLING AND ITS CONSEQUENCES; LORD KENYON AND THE GAMBLING LADIES REVIVAL OF MASQUERADES ; MRS. CORNELYS AND THE PANTHEON ; LICENTIOUSNESS OF THE MASQUERADES THE OPERA, AND ITS ABUSES THE STAGE ; SHERIDAN, KEMBLE, THE O. P. RIOTS PRIVATE THEATRICALS ; WARCRAVE AND WYNN- 8TAY; THE PIC-NICS THE SHAKESPEARE MANIA; IRELAND'S FORGERIES AND BOYDELL'S SHAKSPEARE GALLERY ART, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE PETER PINDAR AND THE ARTISTS ; THE VENTIAN SECRET STATE OF THE PERIODICAL PRESS ; LITERATURE IN GENERAL; BOZZY AND PIOZZI SCIENCE ; THE SOCIETIES; SIR JOSEPH BANES pp. 533 581 CHAPTER XV. GEORGE III. THE IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT CHANGE OF MINISTRY PEACE WITH FRANCE NEW STEP IN BUONAPARTE'S AMBITION RENEWAL OF HOSTILITIES, AND THREATENED INVASION DEFENSIVE AGITATION; VOLUNTEERS; CARICA- TURES AND SONGS RETURN OF PITT TO POWER BUONAPARTE EMPEROR TRAFALGAR DEATHS OF PITT AND FOX GENERAL ELECTION, WITH WARM CONTESTS THE SPANISH WAR pp. 582 624 CHAPTER XVI. GEORGE III. AND THE REGENCY. .NEW PROSPECTS STRUGGLES OF PARTIES; SIR FRANCIS BURDETT ; JOHN BULL IN ADMIRATION THE REGENCY THE WAR ; ELBA ; WATERLOO ; ST. HELENA ENGLAND AFTER THE PEACE ; TAXATION AND REFORM ; THE DANDIES AND THE HOBBY-HORSES pp. 625 C31 LIST OF FULL PAGE ENGRAVINGS. GEORGE III. AND BONAPARTE, AS THE RINGS OF BROBDIGNAG AND LILMPCT To face the title. THE MOTION . . 128 CITY TRAINED BANDS 165 THE ELECTION CANVASSING FOR VOTES 183 LE MALADE IMAGINAIRE 221 BETTLING THE ODD TRICK 256 CARLO KHAN'S TRIUMPHAL ENTRY .373 THE POLITICAL BANDITTI .421 SMELLING OUT A RAT 452 TWO PAIR OF PORTRAITS 52fi AN IRISH HOWL 528 ARMED HEROES 593 THE HAND-WRITING UPON THE WALL ........ 603 FROM A MIITIAT17IUE PAJTJTED BY HIMVEI*. BY .1C CARICATURE HISTORY OF THE GEORGES. CHAPTER I. GEORGE I. State of Parties at the end of Queen Anne's Reign High-Church and Dr. Sacheverell Accession of George I. Political Squibs that followed Attacks upon the ex- Ministers Robert, the Political Juggler Agitation at the Elections Jacobitish Popularity of the Duke of Ormond Caricatures of the Pretender Jacobite Riots and the Riot Act Failure of the Rebellion and Exultation of the Whigs History of the London Jacobite Mob The King's Departure for Hanover. IT was the 3oth July, 1714, when a queen of England had just sunk upon her death-bed ; and, perhaps, no monarch ever left the world in the midst of more critical circumstances. Not that the loss of the Queen herself was the object of any especial regret ; for we are informed in the papers of the time, that, on the morning of the 3ist, when it was reported in London that Anne was dead, the public funds immediately rose three or four per cent, and that in the afternoon, when it was known that she was still alive, they fell at once to their former value. We must review briefly the politics of the years which had immediately preceded, to understand this singular position of affairs. Two opposing parties had arisen out of the revolution of '88. The Whigs, as the natural and stanch supporters of the new state of things, had continued, with but slight interruptions, to hold the reins of government, when they were at length thrown out of power by the intrigues of the Bed-chamber in 1 7 1 o, at a moment when they had every reason to suppose themselves strong in the confidence and sympathies of their countrymen. The Tories, even when most moderate, were a PARTY VIOLENCE. secret well-wishers to the exiled family ; and this feeling, cherished more or less strongly, produced various shades or gradations of party, until it expressed itself in a form little short of open treason in the non-jurors and Jacobites. There can be little doubt that the whole Tory party of the reign of Queen Anne would have ultimately declared in favour of the Pretender, had he once obtained any certain prospect of success. The antipathy between the two great political parties was of the bitterest description; and each endeavoured to render its opponents odious to the public by personal abuse and calumny, which were scattered abroad with the scurrilous licence of the press that had been handed down from the times of the Com- monwealth and Charles the Second. It is hardly possible to conceive anything more abhorrent to good feeling than the virulent language of the political pamphlets of the age of which we are speaking, which crept even into the more respectable literature of the day. A Tory newspaper, the Post-Boy of March 30, 1 7 14, observes seriously, that "To desire the Whigs to forbear lying, we are sensible would be a most unreasonable request ; because it is their nature, and their faction could not subsist without it." Their enemies endeavoured to throw upon the Whigs, as a body, the imputation with which the Common- wealth men had been stigmatized in the previous century : they were a hypocritical set of schismatics and republicans, worthy only to figure on the gallows or the pillory. A song, circulated in 1712, describes them as a pack of ill-grained dogs. " There's atheists and deists, and fawning Dissenter ; There's republican sly, and long-winded canter j There's heresy, schism, and mild moderation, That's still in the wrong for the good of the nation ; There's Baptist, Socinian, and Quakers with scruples, 'Till kind toleration links 'em all in church-couples. " Some were bred in the army, some dropt from the fleet ; Under bulks some were litter'd, and some in the street ; Some are good harmless curs, without teeth or claws ; Some were whelp'd in a shop, and some runners at laws ; Some were wretched poor curs, mongrel starvers and setters, Till, dividing the spoil, they put in with their betters." The Whigs were by no means backward in throwing similar dirt in the faces of the Tories, whom they looked upon in the light of traitors and rebels. Among the clergy, unfortunately, these political animosities were more acrimonious than among the laity, and the pulpit everywhere teemed with seditious and libellous sermons. A considerable portion of the clergy had BEHAVIOUR OF THE CLERGY. 3 refused to acknowledge King William, and were strongly tainted with Jacobitism; and a still greater number had only con- formed to the circumstances of the times, reluctantly and with mental reservations, in order to preserve the temporal advan- tages they derived from the Church. Although several of the bishops, such as Burnet and Hoadly, with a number of the lower clergy, were distinguished by their liberal and tolerant feelings, a very large party, who claimed the lofty-sounding title of the High-Church, hated everything like a Dissenter with an intense spirit of persecution, and detested the Whigs as much for the protection they afforded them, as for their political creed. The Tory papers could hardly allude to a mis- fortune which had occurred to a Dissenter without a sneer or a joke. The Weekly Packet of November 12, 1715, has the following article : " On Monday last, the Presbyterian minister at Epsom broke his leg, which was so miserably shattered, that it was cut off the next day. This is a great token, that those pretenders to sanctity do not walk so circumspectly as they give out." The other party was by no means slow in retaliating on the Church, which lost its dignity and its sacred character in these unseemly disputes. The Whig pamphlets and songs pic- tured in broad colours the unsanctitied lives of many of the Church clergy, their venality and greediness ; and one song ends with the taunt, that "They swallow all up Without e'en a gulp : There's nought chokes a priest but a halter." Unfortunately, too, many of the leading men on both sides sullied their great talents by dishonesty and profligacy, and gave a handle for the malice of their opponents. The Revolution had been essentially aristocratic in character, and no appeal had then been made to the passions of the multi- tude. Hence arose the great strength of the Whigs in the House of Lords. The first regular political mob was a High- Church mob, stirred up for the purpose of raising a clamour against the Whigs, and to influence the elections for Parliament. This appeal to the lower orders was made through a divine of very little moral character and no great abilities, the notorious Dr. Henry Sacheverell, who, a renegade from Whiggism which had not been profitable to him, was now a violent Tory with a better prospect of gain ; and, after two or three attacks on the Government, which had been passed over with contempt, preached a sermon at St. Paul's before the Lord Mayor and B 2 4 DR. SACHEVERELL. Corporation on the 5th of November, 1 709 ; in which, taking for his text the words of St. Paul, " Perils from false brethren," he held up the Whig Lord Treasurer Godolphin to the hatred of his countrymen under the title of Volpone, attacked in a scurrilous manner the bishops who were against persecuting the Dissenters, condemned the Revolution, and asserted in the broadest sense the doctrine of passive obedience to arbitrary power. Such of the congregation as listened to the sermon were offended at the language of the preacher ; and the matter was brought before the Privy Council, which determined upon an impeachment, and thus fell into a snare that had perhaps been laid for them. The seditious sermon was printed, and the Tories exerted themselves with so much activity in dispersing it abroad, that no less than forty thousand copies are said to have been sold. A tedious trial, ill-conducted, ended in the con- demnation of the sermon (which was burnt by the hangman), and in the Doctor being inhibited from preaching during three years. * The trial was the making of Sacheverell ; he was now held forth by the High-Church party as a martyr for the good cause ; and it was darkly intimated that the Queen (who had a strong leaning towards the High Church) secretly approved of his conduct. Every kind of means was employed to provoke people to join in the cry, that the Church and the Crown were in danger from those who now ruled the country, and that Sacheverell was persecuted because he had stood up in their defence. Incendiary sermons were preached from the pulpit ; money is said to have been freely distributed among the mob, and songs were written to keep up the excitement ; even carica- tures, which at this time were not so much in use as half a century later, were made in considerable numbers on this occa- sion. In fact, it was the first event of English history in the eighteenth century which furnished a subject for caricatures. Dean Kennett, in a pamphlet published in 1714,* tells us, that, " For distinguishing the friends of Dr. Sacheverell as the only true churchmen, and representing his enemies as betrayers of the Church, there were several cuts and pictures designed for the mob; among others a copper-plate, with a crown, mitre, bible, and common prayer, as supported by the truly evangelical and apostolical, truly monarchical and episcopal, truly legal and canonical, or truly Church of England fourteen," who had sup- * The Witdom of looking backwards, p. 1 3. Several of the prints here alluded to are in the collection of Mr. Hawkins. In general, they are equally poor in design and execution. I have not met with a copy of the " copper-plate " described by Kennett. SACHEVERELL SONGS. $ ported Sacheverell through his trial. A verse or two will be quite sufficient as a sample of the Sacheverell songs. One of them, entitled " The Doctor Militant ; or, Church Triumphant," to be sung to the tune of " Pakington's Pound," begins with the following attack upon the Whigs : "Bold Whigs and fanatics now strive to pull down The true Church of England, both mitre and crown ; To introduce anarchy into the nation, As they did in Oliver's late usurpation. In Queen Anne's happy reign They attempt it again, Who burn the text, and the preacher arraign. Sachev'rell, Sacbev'rell, thou art a brave man, To stand for the Church and our gracious Queen Anne." It must be confessed that there was little in the doings of the Whigs of Queen Anne's reign to justify the fear that they were introducing anarchy. After a few more verses in this strain, and some allusions to the turbulence under the Commonwealth, the song ends with a lamentation for the loss of the "golden days" of King Charles the Second : " While knaves thus contended to sit on the throne, The owner had hopes to recover his own ; And so it fell out in the midst of their jars, The King's restoration did finish the wars ; In whose golden days The Church held the keys, And kept in subjection such rebels as these. For there were Sachev'rells, whom God did inspire To rescue the Church from fanatical fire." But the allusions of the time show us that there were many songs of a far more violent, and even treasonable character, which were sung about the streets, and only printed clandestinely. Few or none of these have been preserved, but they probably pointed much more distinctly to the real aim of the party, the introduction of the Pretender, to the exclusion of the House of Hanover, which was the covert design of all this abuse of the Cromwellian period and lavish praise of the reign of the restored Charles. This design we shall very soon see carried out more openly. Another song, entitled "High-Church Loyalty," goes on in the same tone as the one quoted above : " Ye Whigs and Dissenters, what would ye have done t Ne'er think of restoring your old '41. Then fill up a bowl, fill it up to the brim ; Here's a health to all those whom the Church do esterm ! 6 CARICATURES OF SACHEVERELL. We know the pretence, you for liberty bawl ; But had you your will, you'd destroy Chuich and all. Then fill, &c. * * * While the Phoanix stands up, and the Bow bells do ring, Here's a health to Sachev'rell, and God bless the Queen !" This song was answered and parodied in doggrel about as good as that in which it was itself written : "You pinnacle-flyers, where would you advance? What, would ye be bringing of Perkin from France ? Instead of a bowl fill'd up to the brim, A halter for those that would bring Perkin in ! " The Whigs not only wrote and sung against Sacheverell, but they caricatured him, and that very severely. In an engraving THE THREE FALSE BRETHREN. ot this time the Doctor is represented iu the act of writing his sermon, prompted on one side by the Pope and on the other by the Devil, these three being the "false brethren" from whom the Church was really in danger. The other party, in revenge, caricatured Bishop Hoadly, the friend of the Dissenters, and one of the most able of the Low-Church party, in a number of prints, in which the evil one was pictured as closeted with that prelate, whose bodily infirmities were turned to ridicule. More- over, they made a nearly exact copy of the caricature of Sacheverell, with a bishop mitred in the place of the Pope, and the Devil flying away in terror at the Doctor's sermon, thus insinuating that this miserable tool was the great defence of the Church of Christ against the attacks of Satan. A remarkable instance of this adaptation of one design to the two sides of the SACHEVERELL MOBS. 7 question is furnished by the medal, which must have been dis- tributed in large quantities, having on one side the head of the preacher surrounded by the words H. BACH. D.D., while the inscription on the reverse, is FIBM TO THEE, surrounded on some copies of the medal a mitre, and on others the head of the Pope, thus being calculated to suit purchasers of all parties.* The Whigs looked upon him as the trumpeter of the Pope, while with the Tories he was the champion of the Church of England. For the Whigs and Dissenters had raised the cry of " No Popery !" in answer to the Tory outcry of the danger of the Church ; and every sensible man saw that the contest between High Church and Low Church was in reality a struggle for the succession to the crown between the House of Stuart and the House of Hanover. A large portion of the nation looked forwards, with a variety of different feelings, to the possibility of Queen Anne being succeeded on the throne by the Pretender. It was clearly with this object that a cabal sought to displace the Whig ministry. Plunder and mischief were a much greater incitement than any abstract principles to the class of persons who composed the mob ; and the Dissenters, who were not per- secuted for any crimes of their own, but for the pretended offences of the older age of Presbyterian rule (for under the tolerant governments of King William and Queen Anne they had become a quiet and harmless portion of the community), were deliberately pointed out as objects of attacks. On the second day of Sacheverell's trial, the mob which had followed him to Westminster Hall was assembled in the evening ; and, being joined by a multitude of persons of the very lowest class of society, proceeded to Lincoln's-Inn Fields, where was the meeting-house of a celebrated Dissenting preacher, Mr. Burgess, now known by the name of Gate-street Chapel. The mob burst into this chapel ; and, amid ferocious shouts of " High Church and Sacheverell !" tore out the pulpit, pews, and everything combustible, and with these and the cushions and bibles maue a large bonfire in the middle of Lincoln's-Iun Fields. They * The caricatures here alluded m POLITICAl JUGGLKB ' Garden) exhibiting his puppets to the world. " Well, gentlemen, you shan't be baulk'd. I'll hang la THE ISLE OF NOSES. out my canvas too, and like my brother monster-mongers, well daub'd into the bargain. Stare then and behold the novel figure. You see what is written over his head, This is Mr. Powel that's he the little crooked gentleman, that holds a staff in his hand, without which he must fall. The sight is well worth your money, for you may not see such another these seven years, nay, perhaps not this age." In one part of this book we have a rather ingenious story or vision of an island of noses, in which the dreamer meets with a large hooked nose (Marlborough) , covered with rags and dirt, the reward he had received for beating the enemies of his country. Suddenly - a procession of flat-noses is seen approaching ; " for a distemper lately come from France [an allusion to the intrigues of Anne's last ministry with the French court] has swept away most of our palates, and sunk our noses in the manner that you will see, and that is one reason why the high hook-noses have of late been so much out of fashion." " My friend was going on, when, at the end of the aforesaid cavalcade, a parcel of rabble flat Frenchify'd bridgeless noses came and set upon him in a most base and barbarous manner, and with a snuffling broken tone, call'd him ' Traytor ! ' Upon which my friendly Mucterian took to his heels, and by that escap'd their fury. I eould not but ask in a fret why they dealt with him in that inhuman manner ; which I no sooner had said, when up comes a nose quite black and rotten, and in pieces of words tells me that I am a sawcy fellow to question a thing so well known. 'As what?' quoth I. 'As what?' says he; why, that fellow you was in company with is a traytor, for 'tis plain he beat our enemies, and so prolonged an offensive war. Besides he's a high hooked nose, and is a traytor of course !' Indeed, I observed my friend's nose was something high and crooked; but, in all my life, I never heard the shape of a nose urged as treason before. In short, these vile flat-noses [the Tories] did not stay for my answer ; but one of the most stinking among them blew himself out upon me, and then called me ' Nasty fellow !' and so left me to wipe up the affront." The discomfited Tories, who were not generally backward in taking up the pen, or deficient in able men to use it, were at first entirely confounded by the sudden and unexpected course >f events. One of the first lampoons upon the Whigs came from the pen of the scurrilous publican-poet, Ned Ward. Marlborough, who had sought quiet in voluntary exile, the high hooked-nose escaped from the flat-noses, as Thomas Bur' nett has it, returned immediately on the death of the Queen, ATTACKS ON MABLBOEOUGH. 13 landed at Dover, and was conducted in triumph to London by a long train of gentlemen in carriages and on horseback, on the 4th of August. The Hanoverian envoy, Bothmar, writes, that the Duke " came to town amidst the acclamations of the people, as if he had gained another battle of Hochstet." Ned Ward gave vent to the spleen of his party by ridiculing this proces- sion in Hudibrastic doggrel, under the title of " The Republican Procession; or, the tumultuous Cavalcade." Ward describes the Duke's escort as " Consisting of a factious crew, Of all the sects in Rosse's ' ' View,"* From Calvin's Anti-Babylonians, Down to the frantick Muggletonians ; Mounted on founder'd skins and bones, That scarce could crawl along the stones, As if the Roundheads had been robbing The higglers' inns of Ball and Dobbin, And all their skeletonian tits That could but halt along the streets : The frightful troops of thin-jaw'd zealots, Curs'd enemies to kings and prelates. Those champions of religious errors, Looking as if the prince of terrors Was coming with his dismal train To plague the city once again." The Tories of that age affected to look with contempt on the commercial interests of the country, and on the moneyed houses of the City, for the merchants had placed their confidence in the foreign policy of the Whigs. Ward, after speaking of the " Low-Church city elders," says : " Next these, who, like to blazing stars, Portend domestic feuds and wars, Came managers and bank-directors, King-killers, monarchy-electors, And votaries for lord-protectors ; That, had old subtle Satan spread His net o'er all the cavalcade, He might at one surprizing pull Have fill'd his low'r dominion full Of atheists, rebels, Whigs, and traytors, Reforming knaves and regulators ; And eas'd at once this land of more And greater plagues than Egypt bore." Under the circumstances of the times, the Tories did not * Alexan-ler Ross was the author of a book, rather well known at that time, entitled, "View of all Religions, with a Discovery of all known Heresies, and Lives of Notorious Hereticks," published in 1696. 14 STREET LIBELLERS. venture, except in rare instances, to exhibit the extent of their exasperation by the ordinary way of publicity. They reckoned again upon the mob to embarrass the Government, and a multi- tude of low libels and seditious papers were hawked and distri- buted about the streets for halfpence and pence, which kept the populace in a perpetual state of excitement. Few of these papers are now preserved. There is one, in a broadside, " price one penny," in the British Museum, which, under the title of " A Dialogue between my Lord B ke and my Lord W n," (Bolingbroke and Wharton,) contains a satirical attack on the Duke of Marlborough, when he was returning to England. Before the end of August a multitude of such penny and halfpenny libels were spread over the country, in which the Whigs were compared to the levellers of the days of Charles I. ; and attacks, as scurrilous and indecent as they were unprovoked, were heaped upon the Dissenters. " The Tories," says a newspaper of the date just mentioned, " who have the black mob on their side, cry, ' No calves' heads !' ' No king- killers !' " In November, the political hawkers and ballad- singers had become extremely troublesome about the streets of London, and the Lord Mayor was compelled to seize upon many of them, and throw them into the House of Correction. On the 1 6th of November, an Order of Council appeared for the suppression and punishment of " false and scandalous libels " hawked about the streets ; and on the 24th of the same month another proclamation to the same purpose was made ; but the object of these measures appears to have been but partially effected. The Political State (November, 1714, p. 446) gives the titles of some of the seditious pamphlets sent abroad in this manner ; among which appears " The Duke of Marlborough's Cavalcade," probably the poem of Ned Ward described above. Some of these papers and ballads appear to have been of a trea- sonable description. To give instances from a little later date, out of a great number which might be collected together, we may mention, that, in the Weekly Packet of January 7, 1716, we are informed, " Last Monday the Lord Mayor committed a woman to Newgate for singing a seditious ballad in Gracechurch Street;" and it is stated in the Flying Post of the ayth of May immediately following, that " last Saturday" the grand jury of the City of London " presented a seditious and scanda- lous paper, called ' Kobin's last Shift, or Shift Shifted,' and the singing of scandalous ballads about the streets, as a common nuisance, tending to alienate the minds of the people ; and we hear an order will be published to apprehend those who cry ATTACKS ON THE DISSENTERS. 15 about or sing such scandalous papers, They have also presented such as go about with wheelbarrows and dice, and make it their practice to cheat people ; and such as go about streets to clean shoes ou the Sabbath day." Scraps of information like this give us a curious view of the streets of London nearly a hundred and fifty years ago. The prejudices against Dissenters were inflamed in every possible manner, for the hardly concealed purpose of raising a new High-Church mob, and exerting through it the same violent influence over the elections which had been so successful in bringing together the Parliament that was now separating. Two agents, opposite enough in their characters, were actively employed in this work the pulpit and the stage. Before the end of December it was found necessary, by a royal proclama- tion, to order the clergy to avoid entering upon state affairs in their sermons. At the theatre, the plays or the prologues often contained political sentiments or allusions which led at times to serious riots. Farces were brought out in which the Dissenters were exhibited in an odious or degrading light. To quote from the journals of the period at which the consequent excitement was pushed up to its highest point, and when mobs were perpe- trating mischief and destruction in many parts of the kingdom, we find advertised, in the beginning of June, 1715, "The City Ramble ; or, the Humours of the Compter. As it is now acted with universal applause at the theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields. By Captain Knipe." It is added, that the book was "adorned with a curious frontispiece, respecting a Presbyterian teacher and his doxy as committed to the Compter." I have not been able to meet with the book, or the " curious frontispiece," which was what may be looked upon legitimately as a caricature ; but it had no doubt an immediate aim, for the theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields was in close proximity to the same celebrated Dissenters' meeting-house which had been so rudely treated by the Sache- verell mob. Even at Oxford, after a High-Church riot about this time, a member of the University, in an anonymous tract in justification of it, stated that an anabaptist preacher of that town had baptized two young women in the morning, and been found in bed between them at night, one of those slanderous stories which had been borrowed from the days of the Cavaliers. The effect of this incessant agitation was not long in showing itself; for the first outbreak took place on the clay of the King's coronation, the 2oth of October, 1714. On the evening of that day, the citizens of Bristol illuminated their windows, and made bonfires in the stroots, and the corporation gave a ball. The i6 VIOLENCE OF THE ELECTIONS. first signal for the riot which followed is said to have been a re- port that the Whigs were going to burn the effigy of Sacheve- rell ; upon which a mob suddenly collected together and rushed through the streets, breaking the windows that were illuminated, and putting out the bonfires, at the same time raising ferocious shouts of " Down with the Roundheads ! God bless Dr. Sache- verell !" They repaired to the town-hall, and threw large stones through the windows of the ball-room, to the great danger of the persons assembled there. The attacks of the mob were now more especially directed against the Dissenters ; they entirely gutted the house of one of them, a baker named Stevens, who was killed by the assailants in an attempt to expostulate with them. This fatal catastrophe appears to have arrested the mob, and no further mischief was done ; but several of the rioters were tried and severely punished. The town of Chippenham, in Wiltshire, continued in an uproar during several nights, and houses were attacked and their inmates ill-treated. Other riots, equally alarming, occurred at the same time at Norwich, Reading, Birmingham, and Bedford. At Birmingham the mob was very violent, and their shout was, " Sacheverell for ever ! Down with the Whigs !" At Bedford, where the proceedings of the mob seem to have been countenanced by the magistrates, the public May-pole was dressed in mourning. In spite of a proclamation against riots, issued on the and of November, the mobs in many places continued to create disturbances. At Axminster, in Devonshire, on the 5th of November, the " High-Church rabble," as the newspapers call them, shouted for the Pretender, and drank his health as King of England. The elections which came on in January were carried on even with more violence than those of 1710 ; * but times were altered, and the Whigs obtained an overpowering majority. It was on these two occasions that English elections of members for Par- liament first took that character of turbulence and acrimony which for more than a century destroyed the peace and tran- quillity of our country towns, and from which they have only been relieved within the last few years. The Flying Post of January 27, 1715, gives the following burlesque "bill of costs Many seditious and treasonable writings were spread about in January, one of which made much noise, and was vigorously prosecuted. Under the title of "English Advice to the Freeholders of England," it was a violent attack upon the Whigs, both personally and collectively, and was particu- larly rancorous against the Duke of Marlborough ; it pointed out the pre- tended dangers of the Church from the principles of the House of Hanover, and exhorted the electors to fly to its aid. ELECTIONEERING EXPENSES. 17 for a late Tory election in the West," in which part of the country the Tory interest was strongest : s. d. Imprimis, for bespeaking and collecting a mob . .2000 Item, for many suits of knots for their beads . 30 o o For scores of huzza-men . . . . . . 40 o o For roarers of the word " Church " . . . . 40 o o For a set of " No Roundhead" roarers . . . 40 o o For several gallons of Tory punch on church tomb- stones . . . . . . . . 30 o o For a majority of clubs and brandy-bottles . .2000 For bell-ringers, fiddlers, and porters . . . .1000 For a set of coffee-house praters . . . . 40 o o For extraordinary expense for cloths and lac'd hats on show days, to dazzle the mob . . . . 50 o o For Dissenters' damners 40 o o For demolishing two houses ..... 200 o o For committing two riots ...... 200 o o For secret encouragement to the rioters . . . 40 o o For a dozen of perjury men ..... too o o For packing and carriage paid to Gloucester . 50 o o For breaking windows . . . . . . 20 O O For a gang of alderman-abusers . . . . 40 o o For a set of notorious lyars 50 o o For pot-ale 100 o o For law, and charges in the King's Bench . . . 300 o o 1460 o o It will be observed in this " bill " that bribery is not put down as one of the prominent features of an election at this period ; violence was, as yet, found to be more effective than corruption. The new Parliament met towards the end of March. The following statement in the Weekly Packet (a Tory paper) of April 2, 1715, will furnish an amusing picture, not only of parliamentary manners outside the house at this date, but of the wild spirit of party : " Last week the footmen belonging to the members of the House of Commons, according to the custom of their masters, (which they had strictly imitated for more than thirty years,) proceeded to the choice of a Speaker; when those that espouse the cause of the Whigs chose Mr. Strickland's man, and the Tory livery gentry the servant of Sir Thomas Morgan. Hence a battle ensued between the two contending parties, wherein several broken heads discovered the resolution of each to abide by its respective choice, though the combatants were at that time forced to leave the victory undecided (the House rising). But on Monday last they returned to their former trial of skill ; and the Tones, after an obstinate resistance from the i8 JOHN DUNTON. Whigs, who would by no means show themselves passive, but disputed their ground inch by inch, had the better of their adver- saries, and carried their mock Speaker three times round West- minster Hall. After which, he that was chosen to fill their chair, as well as his predecessor, according to ancient usage, spent their crowns apiece in drink at a dinner, which an adjacent ale- house entertained them with gratis." No sooner had the Parliament assembled, than the Tories were alarmed by the threatened impeachment of the late min- isters. This gave rise to a fierce controversy with the pen, before it became a matter of debate in the senate : for two or three weeks, pamphlet upon pamphlet, on both sides of the ques- tion, issued daily from the press, some written calmly and moderately, while others were cliaracterized by all the bitterness and scurrility of the party spirit of those days. Among the Whig writers, who made the greatest noise in their different circles, were Thomas Burnett, already mentioned, whose father the Bishop was now dead, and the more prolific party-writer John Dunton, whose pamphlets were calculated for wider distri- bution among a somewhat lower class of readers. Burnett was rather rudely handled in this controversy, and was made the butt of several satirical tracts, the writer of one of which undertook to prove that he was asleep when he wrote his pamphlet in defence of the impeachment. Dunton was a scheming needy writer ; he was a broken bookseller, and now, as old age approached, sought to gain a support from Government by the zeal and number of his political writings ; he was withal somewhat of a wag. A few months after the date of which we are speaking, on the ist of May, 1716, we learn from the Flying Post that John Dunton and " a devil " (" i. e. a printer's boy : " this appears to be an early instance of the use of the term) were seen marching through the streets of London, and distributing a book entitled " Seeing's believing ; or, King George proved a Usurper." The citizens, astonished that any one should possess the impudence to sell such a book openly, probably thought he was mad ; but he was without delay arrested and carried first before the Lord Mayor, and subsequently before one of the Secretaries of State. A rumour was soon spread abroad that Dunton had become a convert to Jacobitism ; and, while the Whigs were scandalised at his defection, the Tories rejoiced loudly at having gained so popular a champion. But their joy was changed into vexation, when it was made known that the tract in question, instead of being a treasonable libel, was a bitter lampoon on their own party ; and Dunton and his friends went to a noted Whig SONG OF THE DUKE OF OSMOND. 19 tavern in St. John's Lane, to laugh in their sleeves and to drink loyal toasts. The history of the impeachments is well known : Bolingbroke and Ormond fled to France, and openly joined the Pretender, and they were accordingly attainted. Oxford was thrown into the Tower ; but, after a wearisome imprisonment, he escaped without further hurt. The result was advantageous, as far as it secured the principle that ministers of the Crown are personally respon- sible for the acts of their administration ; and it forced secret enemies, who were plotting against the Government, to show themselves openly. Indeed, this measure, probably more than anything else, led to the premature outbreak of the Jacobite re- bellion towards the end of the year. Ormond was the only one of the late ministers who enjoyed much popularity, and his name was now substituted for that of Sache- verell in the cries of the mob. From this moment the Doctor lost his importance ; and within a few years, at the time when Hogarth drew his series of the " Harlot's Progress," Sacheve- rell's portrait was looked upon as a fit companion for that of the no less notorious Captain Mackheath in the vilest dens of profli- gacy. The head of " Duke Ormond " now figured as an orna- ment on articles of common use, as Dr. Sacheverell's had done before ; and a very remarkable proof of the length of time which it requires to eradicate feelings and prejudices impressed on the popular mind in times of great political excitement, is furnished by the following rather droll song upon the Duke of Ormond, preserved traditionally in the Isle of Wight and in Kent. The copy I give here, which is the best I have been able to obtain,* was still sung, some thirty or forty years ago, by several old men in the neighbourhood of Maidstone in Kent. "SONG OF ORMOND AND MARLBOROUGH. **I am Ormond the Brave, did you ever hear of me, A man lately forced from his own country, They sought for my life, and they plundered my estate, Ail for being so loyal to Queen Anne the great. CHOBUS And sing, Hey, ho, ho, I am Ormond, you know, I am Ormond, you know, Though they call me Jemmy Butler, I am Ormond you know. * It was communicated to me by a gentleman of Mereworth, near Maid- atone. In the first edition of this book I printed a much more corrupt and imperfect text, communicated to me by Mr. C. Roach Smith, who had taken it down, in 1841, from the mouth of an itinerant fishmonger in the Isle of Wight, who knew no more about it than that it had been sung by his father c 2 ao SATIRES ON THE PEETENDEB. " Betwixt Ormond and Marlborough arose a great dispute : Says Ormond to Marlborough, ' I was born a duke, And you but a footboy to wait upon a lady; Tou may thank your kind fortune and the wars which have made ye.' And sing, Hey, ho, ho, &c. " ' I never was a traitor, like you, thou false knave, Nor ever cursed Queen Anne when she lay in her grave ; But I was Queen Anne's darling, and my country's delight, And for the crown of England so boldly I did fight.' And sing, Hey, ho, ho, &c. "'Begone, then,' says Ormond, 'you cowardly creature, To rob my poor soldiers, it never was my nature, Which you have done before, as we well understand ; You have filled your own purse, and impoverished the land.' And sing, ' Hey, ho, bo, &c. "Says Marlborough to Ormond, ' Now do not say so, Or from the Court I will force you to go.' Says Ormond to Marlborough, 'Now do not be so cruel, But draw forth your sword, and we'll end it in a duel.' And sing, Hey, ho, ho, &c. " Says Marlborough to Ormond, ' I'll go and ask my lady, And, if she is willing, to fight you I'm ready.' But Marlborough went away, and he came no more there, So this noble Duke of Ormond threw his sword in the air. And sing, Hey, ho, ho, &c." It was by songs of this character that the minds of the lower classes in England were to have been prepared, it was hoped, to join in a general rising in favour of the exiled house of Stuart. The Jacobite minstrelsy of Scotland had, no doubt, its counter- part in this country ; but its effects were much less considerable, and it was soon forgotten, with the exception of scattered scraps like that given above. The name of the Pretender was some- times uttered by the disorderly rabble amid the election riots at the beginning of the year ; but after the flight of Bolingbroke and Ormond it was heard much more frequently, and songs and satires against the Hanoverian family were sought and listened to with avidity. The Whigs replied to these with a shoal of pamphlets and papers, reproducing all the old tales of the Revo- lution, and casting ridicule and contempt upon the son of James II., whom they insisted on looking upon as a mere im- postor. The common story was, that the Pretender was the child of a miller, and that, when newly born, he had been con- and grandfather before him. I look upon this song as one of the most curious relics of English Jacobite literature I have yet met with. It was no doubt one of those sung about the country on the eve of the Rebellion of 1715. I am told that a few years ago this song was commonly sung at the harvest-homes in the Isle of Wight. CARICATURES OF THE PRETENDER. at veyed into the Queen's bed by means of a warming-pan ; and this contrivance having been ascribed to the ingenuity of Father Petre, the Whigs always spoke of the Pretender by the name of Perkin, or little Peter. The warming-pan figures repeatedly in the satirical literature of the day. The birth of the Pretender had been the subject of a number of caricatures, chiefly of foreign growth, in the reign of King William, which were now as suitable as when first published. In one of these the Queen TVr THE CATHOLIC FAMILT. is represented sitting by the cradle, while her Jesuit adviser whispers her in the ear, with his hand over her neck in a familiar manner, which might at least be designated as un peu leste. Ifc is a complete Catholic family. The infant has a child's wind- mill on its bed, to mark the trade of its real parents ; and a bowl of milk and an orange are on the table below. A much larger caricature, executed in Holland, represents the child in its cradle as here, with the wind- mill also, but accompanied by its two mothers and the Jesuit, while the picture is filled with a host of princes, diplomatists, ecclesiastics, &c., looking on with astonishment. It bears the title ' L' Europe allarm6e pour la TRUTH EXPOSING IHX SECRET. 22 HIGH- CHURCH EIOTS IN LONDON. Fils d'un Meunier." Many satirical medals were also distri- buted abroad. One of these, a large silver medal of fine execu- tion, bears on one side a group representing a child on a cushion, crowned and carrying the pax (as the symbol of Eomanism) in his right hand ; but Truth, crushing a serpent with her foot, opens the door of a cupboard or chest under the cushion, in which we see Father Petre pushing the child up through the roof.* The disaffected party now prepared for the dangerous game they were resolved to play by incessant agitation ; for the poli- tical maxim, " Agitate, agitate," was known and practised long before the reigns of King "William and Queen Victoria. The mob was, as usual, soon urged into open violence by the old cry of " The Church !" while the Dissenters underwent a much fiercer persecution than that with which they had been visited in 1710, and they bore it in general with exemplary moderation. On the 23rd of April, 1715, the anniversary of the birthday of Queen Anne, the London mob began to assemble towards even- ing at the conduit on Snow Hill, where they hung up a flag and a hoop, and money having been given them to purchase wine, they collected round a large bonfire. From thence they moved off in parties in different directions, patrolling the streets during the whole night, shouting " God bless the Queen and High- Church ! Bolingbroke and Sacheverell !" and attacking houses, breaking windows, insulting and robbing passengers, and levying contributions everywhere. Many of the mob were armed with dangerous weapons, and several persons were severely wounded. It was at one time proposed to pull down the Dissenters' meeting-houses, but this project was for some reason or other abandoned. The streets continued to be more or less infested in this manner night after night for some time. The 2pth of April was the Duke of Ormond's birthday, and that night the streets of London were the scene of new riots and outrages. On the night of Saturday, May 28 (the King's birthday), and on the Sunday night, the 2pth (the anniversary of the liestora- tion), the mob committed great outrages in different parts of London, and dangerously wounded some of the constables and watch. They burnt the effigies of the chief Dissenting ministers, shouted 'High Church and Ormond !" and publicly drunk the Pretender's health in Ludgate Street and other places. A riot * This medal is still not very uncommon. Copies of it will be found in the collections of Mr. Haggard and Mr. W. H. Diamond. The caricatures alluded to, with others on the same subject, are in the collections of Mr. Hawkins and Mr. Burke. PLOTS AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT. 23 of a similar character occurred at Oxford on the King's birth- day, and the Quakers' chapel was attacked and stript by the mob. Within a few days of this time the same riotous spirit had carried itself into several of the largest provincial towns. At Manchester, early in June, the mob had become absolutely master of the town for several days ; they destroyed all the Dis- senters' chapels, threw open the prison, drunk the Pretenders' health, and committed many outrages. There was near the same time a Jacobite riot at Leeds in Yorkshire. A troop of soldiers were sent to Manchester, and the Mayor of Leeds, who was accused of connivance, was brought to London in the cus- tody of a king's messenger. Yet in July this spirit had become still more general, and had spread especially through Stafford- shire, Shropshire, and Cheshire. Very serious tumults occurred at Wolverhampton, Warrington, Shrewsbury, Stafford, New- castle-under-Line, Litchfield, West-Bromwich, and many other places. The meeting-houses of the Dissenters were everywhere destroyed ; cowardly outrages were committed, and in some places sanguinary combats ended in loss of life. When the mob was pulling down the meeting-house at Wolverhampton, one of their leaders mounted on the roof, flourished his hat round his head, and shouted, " King George and the Duke of Marl- borough !" At Shrewsbury, where the old cry of " High Church and Dr. Sacheverell !" was raised, a justice of the peace and a substantial tradesman were convicted of being ringleaders of the mob. At the end of July there was a serious riot at Leek, in Staffordshire, where much mischief was done ; and there was another at Oxford as late as the ist of September, when the mob shouted, " Ormond !" and " No George !" and the Pre- tender's health was said to have been drunk in some of the colleges. These tumults called forth the Riot Act, still in force, which was passed in the month of June, and which, by making the offence felony, and obliging the city or hundred to make good the damages committed, did much towards restoring order ; but more, perhaps, was done by the wholesale severity shewn towards the rioters in the trials that followed shortly after. A newspaper of the 2nd of September tells us, that " the judges have behaved very bravely." With a view to other events, which were now literally casting their shadow before them, troops of horse were quartered in several of the towns which had shewn themselves most disaffected. We cannot at the present day feel otherwise than astonished at the facility with which these riots were carriei on, and 24 PLOTS AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT. the regular communication which must have existed between the leaders of the mobs in different parts of the country. It would appear as though there had been no laws to provide against such emergencies, and no police or military force dis- tributed through the country to hinder or suppress outbreaks of popular turbulence. It is true that, in London at least, the pillory and the whipping-cart were in daily use ; but these instruments of punishment were robbed of the greater portion of their terrors when a sympathising crowd (paid, as it is said, by richer men of the party) escorted the sufferer, cheered him by their shouts, and carried him away in triumph when it was over. The Flying Post, a violent Whig paper, in its intelligence from Coventry of the date of September 10, gives rather an amusing anecdote of the preventive effect of the new Riot Act, and of the methods sometimes taken to evade it for the perpetration of mischief. On the Sunday preceding, a mob had been collected at Burton-upon-Trent, with the desire at least of pulling down a Dissenters' meeting-house there at the time of divine service ; but, informed of the consequences, they procured a young bull, cut off its ears and tail, tied squibs and crackers to it, and thus goaded it forwards towards the meeting-house door. The Whig writer exultingly tells us how the tortured animal suddenly turned round, and rushed through the mob, knocking down and trampling upon all who stood in its way ; and how it then ran nearly two miles and furiously threw itself into the parish church, where it killed and severely injured several of the congregation. These systematic riots were intimately connected with plots of a more serious character, with which the Government be- came gradually acquainted during the summer months ; and these discoveries upon which many persons of distinction were placed in custody, had a further effect in hastening the com- mencement of the rebellion, while they destroyed the prospects of the Jacobites in England. The prisons throughout the country were soon filled with political offenders, many of whom were Church of England clergymen. Among other persons whom it was thought necessary to place under arrest was Sir William Wyndham, member for Somersetshire (where the Jacobites were strong), and one of the leaders of the Tory party in the House of Commons. A song called " The Vaga- bond Tories," published on the 2oth of August, intimates the suspicion, that he was preparing to fly into France to join the Pretender. SATIRES ON THE JACOBITES. 5 "The knight of such fire From S tshire, Who for High Church is always so hearty, Tho' in England he tarries, Is equipping for Paris, To prevent any schism in the party." Sir Constantino Phipps, the Jacobite ex-Chancellor of Ireland, who had been Sacheverell's advocate at his trial, and to whom the University of Oxford had given a degree in a markedly factious manner on the King's coronation day, is also pointed out as a conspirator : "The impudent P pps Must come in for snips, Who at Oxford so lately was dubb'd ; Tho' instead of degree, Such a bawler as he Deserv'd to be heartily drubb'd. "Young Perkin, poor elf, May promise himself Two things from the face of that man ; There's brass within reach To furnish a speech And the lid of a warming-pan." The taunts on those who had not fled are followed by sneers on those who had : " What Ormond, with fraud, Long ago did abroad, With fear he does over again ; Tis but an old dance To leave England for France, He played the same trick at Denain." * While the ministry of King George was successfully pur- suing measures of security, the exultation of the Whig party sought an outlet in multitudes of songs like the foregoing ; and their newspapers and pamphlets became more numerous and more exciting. Most of these songs are set to the tunes of popular ballads ; one, to the tune of " A begging we will go," thus speaks of the " High-Church rebels : " " See how they pull down meetings, To plunder, rob, and steal ; To raise the mob in riots, And teach them to rebel. Oh ! to Tyburn let them go I An allusion to the desertion of the allies by the English army, under the Duke of Ormond, in the year 1711. 26 SUPPRESSION OF THE REBELLION. "At Oxford, Bath, and Bristol, The rogues design 'd to rise ; But George's care and vigilance There's nothing can surprize. So to Tyburn let them go I " Their plot is all discover'd now, Their treason nought avails ; The Tow'r and Newgate quite are full, And all our county jails. So to Tyburn let them go !* In another, which was a parody upon a Jacobite song, the Tories are made to call upon the Pretender in despair : "To you, dear Jemmy, at Lorrain, We mournful Tories send, Unless you'll venture one campaign, Our cause is at an end : We've nothing left but to be stout, For all our plots are now found out. With a fa la la la," &c. " We sent you first Lord Bolingbroke, In hopes to bring you over ; And then we sent wise Ormond's duke, That rival of Hanover : You need not fear if you are beat, Since he's so good at a retreat ! With a fal la la la, &c." When the rebellion was entirely suppressed, and the Scottish, minstrels were lamenting pathetically the departure of their prince, their brethren in England were indulging in parodies like the following : " 'Twas when the seas were roaring With blasts of northern wind, Young Perkin lay deploring On warming-pan reclin'd : Wide o'er the roaring billows He cast a dismal look, And shiver'd like the willows That tremble o'er the brook." The Tories at the same time appeared discomfited even in their writings. The newspapers give no intelligence, and make no remarks, until, as soon as the rebellion lost all appearance of success, they begin to talk of the "rebels" as if they were themselves staunch supporters of the Hano- verian succession. John Dunton in a pamphlet entitled " Mob "War," published at this time, says, " Even Abel Boper* now * The Post Boy, a Tory newspaper. EXULTATION OF THE WHIGS. 27 grows modest and tender-conscienced. Drunken P tis is wretchedly dull in his Jacobite Packet,* and there are thoughts of dismissing him from the service. Whig papers and pamphlets are only in demand, and the booksellers who engaged in hereditary right are just a breaking. The Examiner \ has spent himself quite, and would give five shillings apiece for political lyes, and three shillings for a probable reflection upon the present ministry." The Tories in general made their peace with the powers that were, by taking the oath of allegiance ; and the Daily Courant of November 30, i7 J 5 contains the following advertisement of a caricature on this subject, of which no copy, as far as I can learn, is now preserved : " This day is published, 'A Call to the Unconverted; being an emblem of the Tories' manner of taking the oaths.' Price sixpence." A week after this, the St. James's Post of December 7 contains the following advertisement : " This day is published, ' An Argument proving all the Tories in Great Britain to be Fools.' Price Fourpence." Amid the uneasiness and alarm which prevailed through- out the country, the metropolis was the continual scene of riot and agitation. There appears to have been no efficient police in London to keep order in the streets, along which it was unsafe to pass after dusk. We have already seen the ascen- dancy which the Jacobite mob had gained there in the spring, and which they seem to have kept undisturbed during the summer, waiting for the numerous anniversary days in the autumn to begin again their riotous proceedings. But a new power was rising up, which though it did not prevent the riots, prevented some of the mischief to which they might have led. Amid the political excitement of the preceding year, which pervaded every class of society, and seemed to have estranged people's minds from every other subject, even the taverns and public-houses of the metropolis had been gradually taking a political character to such a degree, that about this time a guide-book was published, under the title of the " Vade-mecum of Malt-worms," containing a list of all the ale-houses in Lon- don, with an account of the persons who held them, and the political principles of each. Some of these, under the name of mug -houses, became the resort of small societies or clubs of political partisans, who met there on certain occasions to cele- brate memorable anniversaries. Two of the oldest Whig houses * The Weekly Packet, a newspaper we have quoted more than once, t A violent Jacobite paper, at one period chiefly conducted by Swift. 28 LONDON MUG-HOUSES. were the Roebuck, in Cheapside, (opposite Bow Church,) and a mug-house in Long Acre. A society calling itself the Loyal Society, held its meetings at the Roebuck, after the Accession of George I. ; and in the history of the London riots in 1715 and 1716 this house obtained an especial celebrity. Next in fame to these were the Magpie, without Newgate (the Magpie and Stump still standing in the Old Bailey) ; a mug-house in St. John's Lane, Clerkenwell ; another in Tavistock Street, Covent Garden ; one in Salisbury Court, near Fleet Street ; and one in Southwark Park. The two last became eventually objects of great hostility with the mob. The Tory ale-houses, which were less numerous, appear to have stood chiefly about Holborn Hill (Dr. Sacheverell's parish) and Ludgate Street. The Whig societies who frequented the mug-houses began in the autumn of 171.5 to unite in parties to fight the Jacobite mob which had so long tyrannised over the streets, and they were probably joined on such occasions by a number of others, who, like the London apprentices of old, looked upon the whole only as a rough kind of diversion. At the end of October and beginning of November, a num- ber of political anniversaries crowded together. The Prince of Wales's birthday, the 3oth of October, was celebrated on Monday the 3ist. The Flying Post, the chief chronicler of the tumults, informs us that " A parcel of the Jacobite rabble, such as Bridewell boys, &c., committed outrages on Ludgate Hill, broke the windows that were illuminated, scattered a bon- fire, and cried out ' An Ormond ! ' &c. ; but they were dispersed and soundly thrashed by a party of the Loyal Society, who had lately burnt the Pretender in effigy." From this time we shall find the new self-constituted police constantly at war with the mob. The latter had prepared an effigy of King William to be burnt on the anniversary of that monarch's birth, Friday, No- vember 4, and on the approach of night they assembled round a large bonfire in the Old Jewry for that purpose. But infor- mation of their design having been carried to a party of the Loyal Society, who were met at the Roebuck to celebrate King William's birthday, and who were therefore close at hand, these gentlemen hastened to the spot, and " gave the Jacks* due chastisement with oaken plants, demolished their bonfire, and brought off the effigies in triumph to the Roebuck." On the morrow, the 5th of November, the Whig mob had their cele- bration. They had prepared caricature effigies of the Pope, the * This was the term populaily given to the Jacobites. MUG-HOUSE RIOTS. 29 Pretender, Ormond, Bolingbroke, and the Earl of Marr, which were carried in the following order ; " First, two men bearing each a warming-pan, with the representation of the infant Pre- tender, a nurse attending him with a sucking-bottle, and another playing with him by beating the warming-pan." These were followed by three trumpeters, playing Lilliburlero and other Whig tunes. Then came a cart, with Ormond and Marr, appro- priately dressed. This was followed by another cart, containing the Pope and Pretender seated together, and Bolingbroke as the secretary of the latter. They were all drawn backwards, with halters round their necks. The procession, thus arranged, passed from the Eoebuck along Cheapside, through Newgate Street and up Holborn Hill, where the Jacobite bells of St. Andrew's Church were made to ring a merry peal. From thence they passed through Lincoln's-Inn Fields and Covent Garden to St. James's, where they made a stand before the palace ; and so went back by Pall Mall and the Strand, through St. Paul's Churchyard, into Cheapside ; but here they found that the "Jacks" had been beforehand with them, and stolen the faggots which had been pilc-d up for their bonfire. They there- fore made a circuit of the city whilst a new bonfire was pre- pared, and on their return burnt all the effigies amid the shouts of the crowd. The enmity between the mob and the Loyal Society was em- bittered by these first encounters, and it soon came to a fierce issue. On the i7th of November the Loyal Society met at the Roebuck, to celebrate the anniversary of Queen Elizabeth. The mob bad also met to celebrate it, but in a different manner ; and towards seven o'clock in the evening intelligence reached the Roebuck that they had assembled at St. Martin-le-Grand, and were preparing, amid shouts of " High Church, and Ormond, and King James ! " to burn the effigies of King William, King George, and the Duke of Marlborough, in Smithfield. The " Loyal " gentlemen immediately marched out, aud overtook them in Newgate Street, where a desperate fight took place, and, after twenty or thirty of them had been " knocked down," the mob was dispersed. They had concealed their effigies ; but a boy who had been captured pointed them out to the victors, who marched back in triumph to the Roebuck. There they had hardly arrived, when a much greater mob began to assem- ble, and, after breaking the windows of the Roebuck, as well as those of the adjacent houses, and pulling down the sign, pro- ceeded to burst open the door, and threatened summary ven- geance upon the inmates. In this extremity, a member of the 30 ASSAULT UPON THE ROEBUCK. Loyal Society fired with a loaded gun down the passage, and killed one of the assailants, and the Lord Mayor and city officers coming up at the same time, the mob took to their heels. The inquest on the body of the man who was killed returned a verdict that he was slain, while in open riot and rebellion, by some one who had fired in self-defence. On subsequent nights the Eoebuck appears to have been exposed to renewed, but less serious attacks, and the mob war was carried on at least less ostentatiously during the winter. In February we hear again of the riotous conduct of the Jacobite mob, and the mug-houses appear to have been actively refitting and preparing for a new campaign. New songs were compiled and printed for the use of the loyal gentry who fre- quented them, and well suited to keep up the popular excite- ment. One of these gives the following description of the mob, and shows that these faction fights were very serious things. " Since the Tories could not fight And their master took his flight, They labour to keep up their faction ; With a bough and a stick, And a stone and a brick, They equip their roaring crew for action. " Thus in battle array, At the close of the day, After wisely debating their deep plot, Upon windows and stall They courageously fall, And boast a great victory they have got. "But, alas ! silly boys ! For all the mighty noise Of their ' High Church and Ormond for ever 1* A brave Whig with one hand, At George's command, Can make their mightiest hero to quiver." Towards spring festive entertainments were given at most of the mug-houses a sort of house-warming or introduction to the season, at which the proprietors delivered formal addresses, often in verse, stating their sentiments and intentions, and boasted of their former feats against the " Jacks." One of these, the keeper of the mug-house in St. John's Lane, speaks of his fre- quent encounters with the mob, and after threatening what he will do himself, proceeds : " Nor is it for myself I speak alone : There is my wife, 'tis true, she is but one, But, fegs 1 she'll play her part against the tyler's son." MUG-HOUSE SONGS. 3-1 Several of these addresses will be found in the mug-house song- books. One of these festivals is thus announced in the Flying Post of April 12, 1716: "This is to give notice to all gentle- men who are well affected to the present establishment, and lovers of good home-brew'd ale, that this present Thursday, being the iath of April, Mrs. Smyth's mug-house in St. John's Lane, near Smithfield, will be opened ; when there will be a pro- logue spoke, suitable to the occasion." And on the 2ist of April the same paper prints this "prologue," with the following editorial remark : " The following is inserted at the request of several honest gentlemen, who are hearty well-wishers to those useful societys that are carry'd on in Long Acre and St. John's Lane, for the reformation of Toryism and the propagation of loyalty to the present happy government." The same news- paper had shortly before given a new mug-house song, com- mencing, " We friends of the mug are met here to discover Our zeal to the Protestant house of Hanover, Against the attempts of a bigotted rover. Which nobody can deny. "Prepare then in bumpers confusion to drink To their cursed devices who otherwise think ; For now that vile int'rest must certainly sink. Which nobody can deny. "The Tories, 'tis true, are yet skulking in shoals, To show their affection to Perkin in bowls ; But in time we will ferret them out of their holes. Which nobody can deny." From this period the members of the Loyal Society send to the newspapers regular reports of their night's campaign, duly dated from the head-quarters at the Roebuck. On the night of the 8th of March, the anniversary of the death of King William, a considerable mob assembled, to the old cry of " High Church and Ormond ! " and marched along Cheapside to the well-known mug-house, where a party of the Loyal Society were met " for the defence of the house ; " but when these issued forth, to the number of " about forty," the mob ran away, leaving many of their sticks behind them. The Loyalists then marched in pro- cession through Newgate Street, paid their respects to the Magpie, where another party was met, and proceeded to Lud- gate Hill in bravado of the "Jacks," who were strong there; but on their return they found that the mob had been collecting in greater strength in their rear in Newgate Street, where a great fight took place, in which the Whigs were again victorious, 3 MUG-HOUSE SIOTS. after having, to use the words of the newspaper account, " made rare work for the surgeons." The conquerors returned direct to the Roebuck, shouting " King George ! " as they went, and there spent the greater part of the night in drinking loyal toasts. The next very serious tumult occurred on the 23rd of April (the anniversary of the birth of Queen Anne). In the evening of that day the marrow bones and cleavers, the usual signal of gathering for the mob, were heard rattling along the streets ; and, towards seven o'clock, parties were to be seen forming in Smithfield, the Old Bailey, Ludgate Hill, and Fleet Street, to shouts of "High Church and Ormond!" "No Rump Parlia- ment!" and other similar cries. The Loyalists began to as- semble at the Roebuck about the same time, and by nine o'clock had become tolerably numerous ; upon which they marched forth in procession to the Magpie, and thence to Ludgate Hill, where the mob showed themselves, but would not stand. The Loyal Society then returned to the Roebuck, from whence they made a circuit into the city and returned again to the Roebuck with- out meeting with any opponents. But they had hardly settled themselves down to their mugs, when news arrived that the mob was coming up in great force. They then lost no time in gaining the street, and found the mob already in Cheapside at the end of Wood Street, where there was a fierce battle, ending as usual in the discomfiture of the '* Jacks." The heroes of the Roebuck now marched towards the Magpie ; but at the end of Giltspur Street they again found the mob, and had a more obsti- nate fight than before, but with the same result, and they returned to their quarters with a pile of captured hats and sticks as trophies. An anniversary was now approaching which had always been celebrated with tumults, and such preparations appear to have been made for the present occasion, as shewed that the mob did not act solely by their own impulse. On the 2pth of May, the anniversary of the Restoration of Charles II., green boughs were carried about the streets and worn on the person ; and there were large meetings at St. Andrew's (to hear Dr. Sacheverell), and at the " Jacobites' conventicle in Scroops' Court, over against it." Towards night the mob became very riotous, and threatened to pull down the Roebuck and the mug-house in St. John's Lane. One of the lookers-on says, " There never was seen such a crew of tatterdemalions, for they looked as if hell had broke loose. They had gathered together all the blackguard boys, wheelbarrow-men, and ballad-singers, and knocked down MUG-HOUSE RIOTS. 33 people that did not carry their badges." They were, however, "soundly thresh 'd " by the societies which met at the two mug- houses they had threatened ; and a party of horse guards, which just then arrived and patrolled the streets during the night, put an end to the disturbance. Yet on the loth of June, the birth- day of the Pretender, there were greater riots than ever, and tin* Loyal Society had to bring their whole force to the struggle. A Roebuck correspondent of the Flying Post writes some days after, " You omitted to take notice, that, on the loth of June, several Whigs of the Loyal Society at the Roebuck, having fur- nish'd themselves with little warming-pans fit for the pocket, did ring such a dismal peal with them in the ears of the white-rose mob, that their flowers soon disappeared, and could not keep 'em from fainting." The white rose was the Pretender's badge, and had been worn on this occasion. From this time we hear less of the Roebuck in the public prints, although it had hitherto eclipsed the fame of the other houses. But they also had been engaged with their respective mobs, especially the mug-house in Southwark, and that in Salis- bury Court. On the I2th of July following the last-mentioned exploit of the Roebuck heroes, a mob, armed with clubs, assembled in Southwark, with shouts of " High Church and Ormond ! " " Down with the mug-houses ! " and, attacking the mug-house there, broke the shutters and windows. The society within, however rushed out, and drove them away. A week after this, on Friday, the 2oth of July, the London mob, which, we are told, had " strangely " increased since the King's de- parture for Hanover, made a desperate attack OH a mug-house in Salisbury Court. The society then assembled there sent for assistance to their allies in the mug-house in Tavistock Street ; and, thus reinforced, they succeeded in driving away the assailants. A second attack was, however, made by a much stronger mob on the evening of Monday the 23rd ; but the society held them successfully at bay till the following morning, when they had been so much increased that further resistance seemed vain. The proprietor of the house, named Read, then advanced to the door with a blunderbuss, and threatened any one who should attempt to enter the house. Instead of falling back, the mob rushed towards him with clubs and sticks, whereupon he fired and shot their ringleader dead. The mob, rendered still more furious, threw themselves upon Read, and left him to appearance lifeless: and then broke down the sign, entirely gutted the lower part of the house, drank as much ale in the cellar as they could, and let tho rest run out. The magistrates and soldier* 34 PERSONAL LIBELS ON THE KING. arrived about mid-day, and dispersed the mob, though not till a soldier and some other persons had been severely injured in the fray. The Loyal Society, who had barricaded themselves in the upper part of the house, were thus relieved from their unpleasant position. The inquest gave a verdict of wilful murder against Head, and he was brought to trial, but acquitted, and the Government made good the damage he had sustained. Several of the rioters were also brought to their trial ; and, convicted of being active in the work of destruction, they were hanged with- out mercy. This event appears to have thrown a final damp upon the spirits of the mob. At the end of June, the King left England for Hanover. On his departure a treasonable libel was hawked about the streets, entitled " King G 's farewell to England ; or, the Oxford Scholars in mourning." We know little of the contents of the libels against the King's person which were thus hawked about the streets ; but to judge from what is preserved in some of the early Scottish Jacobite songs, the scandals attached to George's wife and to his mistresses were plentifully raked up. The latter were often hooted by the mob as they passed through the streets. Horace Walpole, in his Reminiscences, assures us that nothing could be grosser than the ribaldry that was vomited out in lampoons, libels, and every channel of abuse, against the Sovereign and the new Court, and chaunted even in their hearing in the public streets. CHAPTER II. GEORGE L Party Feeling after the Rebellion Prevalence of Highway Robbery The Mob Bishop Hoadly's Sermon, and Colley Gibber's " Non-Juror "* The French Mississippi Scheme The South Sea Bubble Sudden Mul- tiplication of Stock Jobbing Bubbles Fall of the " Paper Kin " Law The South Sea Ballads South Sea Caricatures Bubble Cards, and Stock- Jobbing Cards Knight and the " Screen " Elections for a New Parliament New Efforts in favour of the Pretender Bishop Atter- bury's Plot. fT^HE hasty and ill-advised and ill-conducted Rebellion of 1715 had effectually strengthened the power of the Whig party, and had shewn to all reasonable and thinking persons how little was to be expected from a person deficient in courage and in capacity as the Pretender had shewn himself. After the excitement caused by trials and executions of rebels had subsided, the political strife of the day sank down into a dull and monotonous war of newspaper abuse and mob sedition, which lasted for several years, with no other variety than that occasioned by some accidental outburst of more than ordinary virulence. We read almost daily of the application of the pillory or the lash to punish seditious ballad singers and indiscreet individuals, generally of a low class in life, who had made too open an exhibition of hostility to the House of Hanover. Almost every newspaper or periodical, whether Tory or Whig, became in turn the object of prosecution for letting its party zeal go beyond the limits of moderation, although the Tory press came in for much more than an equal share of punishment. Restrained, indeed, from any more effectual method of showing their hostility, except in an occasional duel or riot, the language of the opposition became more violent and scurrilous ; and the lowest and most trivial occurrences were greedily seized upon as an opportunity for insulting a political opponent. In the begin- ning of February, 1717, two street bullies had drawn their swords and killed a drunken man, and had been hanged for the murder. Some of the Tory papers stated that the offenders had been members of one of the Whig societies which met at tho taverns, or, as they were now familiarly termed " Muggites." The Whig newswriters indignantly repelled thu accusation, and, D 2 36 XITrJSBXHSS OF PAETYISM. in revenge, declared that they were both known to be notorious Tories, or "Jacks." On the 4th of January, 1718, Read's Weekly Journal (a violent Whig paper) tells us, that, " Last Thursday morning, a woman we suppose High Church, coming out of a Geneva shop in Ked-Cross Street, fell down, and within some few minutes departed this mortal life for another." The latter part of the phrase is au example of the loose style of writing which distinguishes the newspaper literature of the day. A paper of this period gravely tells us, that " Yesterday three ladies were brought to bed of a male child,'" and proceeds to give their names. About the same date last quoted, a Tory paper, describing the immodest behaviour of some young women in church, asserts that they belonged to a violent Whig family ; while the Whig journals made every unfortunate woman who was committed to Bridewell a Tory. A Whipr clergyman was stated to have refused to bury a man who died an " impenitent Tory." This bitterness of party feeling was often shewn in practical jokes. Read's Weekly Journal of June 15, 1717, says, "Last Monday being suppos'd to be the birthday of the sovereign of the white rose, in respect to the anniversary an honest Whig went from the Roebuck to St. James's, with a jack-daw finely drest in white roses, and set on a warming-pan bedeckt with the same sweet-scented commo- dity, which caused abundance of laughter all the way, to the great mortification of the knights companions of that order, and all the other Jacks, to see their sovereign so mal- treated in the person of his represent a,tive." The feelings evinced in these few examples tainted and embittered every class of society, and were also attended by a general laxity of morals, and, compared with the present day (or even with almost any other period), an insecurity of property. Robbery was carried on on a fearful scale in the streets of London, even by daylight ; housebreaking was of frequent occurrence by night ; and every road leading to the metropolis was beset by bauds of reckless highwaymen, who carried their depredations into the very heart of the town. Respectable women could not venture in the streets alone after nightfall, even in the city, without risk of being grossly outraged. In the beginning of 1720, we learn from the papers that ladies of condition, when they went out in their chairs at night at the Court end of the town, were often attended by servants with loaded blunderbusses " to shoot at the rogues." The best notion of the state of security of London at this time will be given by a chronicle of acts of robbery with HIGHWAY ROBBERY ABOUT LONDON. 37 violence, taken from the newspapers during three weeks at the end of January and beginning of February, 1720; premising, that it appears, from several circumstances, that the newspapers of that time give a very imperfect and incomplete report of such occurrences. We begin with Wednesday, January 20, on the night of which day five liighwaymen robbed a man, coming to London, near Stratford. Thursday, 21. About five o'clock in the evening, the stage coach from London to Hampstead was attacked and robbed by highwaymen at the foot of the hill, and one of the passengers severely beaten for attempting to hide his money. Friday, 22. Either on this, or on one of the two preceding days, it is not very clearly specified, three highwaymen attacked a gentleman of the Prince's household in his coach near Poland Street, and obliged the watchman to throw away his lanthoru and stand quietly by, while they abused and robbed him. Other highwaymen attacked Colonel Montague as he was passing along Frith Street, Soho, between twelve and one at night, and fired at his coachman and wounded one of his horses because he refused to stand. The Duchess of Montrose, coming from Court in her chair, was stopped by three high- waymen well mounted between Bond Street and the New Building. Saturday, 23. A man was attacked at night by highwaymen in Chiswell Street. The same night a house near Bishopsgate was broken into, and a man murdered. Sunday, 24. At eight o'clock in the evening two high- waymen attacked a gentleman in a coach on the south side of St. Paul's Churchyard, and robbed him. Monday, 25. As the Duke of Chandos, a nobleman cele- brated for his courage against this class of depredators, was coming into town at night from his house at Canons, he was attacked hy five highwaymen, but his servants were too strong for them. They had already committed several robberies on the road. Tuesday, 26. The Chichester mail, going from London about three o'clock in the morning, was attacked by highwaymen in Battersea Bottom, and robbed of its letter-bags. Wednesday, 27. The Bristol mail was robbed on its way to London, and a considerable sum of money taken in I tank bills inclosed in the letters. The same night an extensive robbery was perpetrated at Acton, and a booty of about two thousand pounds taken. Ou one day of this week n lady was stopped in In r chaise near 38 HIGHWAY ROBBERY ABOUT LONDON. "Barclet" Street by highwaymen, and robbed of her money, jewels, and gold watch. Saturday, 30. A house in Bishopsgate Street was broken into. Sunday, 31. A gentleman was robbed and murdered in Bishopsgate Street. Monday, February i. The Duke of Chandos, coming from Canons, had another encounter with highwaymen, whom he captured. Tuesday, 2. The post-boy was attacked by three highway- men in Tyburn Road, but the Duke of Chaudos happening to pass that way, came to his rescue. Wednesday, 3. The stage-coach going in the evening from London to Stoke Newington, was robbed by highwaymen near the Palatine Houses. On one day of this week " all the stage-coaches coming from Surrey to London were robbed by highwaymen." And in the course of the week a gentleman in his coach was robbed near Chelsea ; another was attacked and robbed at twelve o'clock at night at the upper end of Cheapside ; a gang of highwaymen by open day robbed all passengers on the Croydon road for some hours together ; and several robberies were committed on the Epping road. Tuesday, 9. A member of Parliament, with two ladies, returning in a coach from a party near Smithfield at eleven o'clock at night, was dogged by three highwaymen mounted and three on foot till they came to Denmark Street, St. Giles's, where their coach was stopped, and they were rifled of money and jewels to the value of about two hundred and fifty pounds. The robbers drove away the watch, and fired two pistols to frighten the ladies when they screamed for help. Wednesday, 10. A man was beaten and robbed in White Conduit Fields at four o'clock in the afternoon. At night a gentleman was attacked in St. George's Fields, robbed, and beat BO severely that his life was despaired of. Three gentlemen in a hackney-coach were attacked in Denmark Street, St. Giles's, and robbed of everything but their clothes. A man was robbed in Cheapside of his coat and money. This alarming increase of highwaymen about London struck every class of society with terror, for none were secure except those few who could go about strongly guarded. A poor man was stripped of his pence equally with a rich man of his gold. In one instance, close to London, after having robbed a labourer of one shilling and four-pence, the highwayman broke his arm THE MUG-HOUSES DISCOURAGED. 39 with a pistol shot, as a warning of what he might expect if he ventured to go again abroad at night with so little money in his pocket. On the 2jrd of January, a proclamation came out, offering a reward of a hundred pounds, in addition to the pre- vious inducements, for the capture of any highwayman within five miles of London ; the main effect of which was to place con- siderable sums of money in the pockets of the notorious Jonathan Wild, who secured several offenders in and about the metropolis within the space of two or three weeks. Of these, it was observed that several, on examination, proved to be persons moving in their class of society as honest and respectable men ; among them are mentioned a tradesman of good repute in London, the valet of " a great duke," and the keeper of a boxing-school. The affair in Salisbury Court, mentioned in our last chapter, damped considerably the spirits of the mob, although, for a time, the war between the gentlemen of the Roebuck and the " Jacks" continued to be carried on upon a less extensive scale. The Tories began to complain, and with some reason, that the mug- houses were themselves the chief provocations to these nightly tumults. It appears that in the beginning of November, 1717, the society of the Roebuck had fought with the butchers, who composed the most active part of the mobs of this period. On the 1 6th of November, the Whig Weekly Journal has the fol- lowing paragraph : " Whereas the author of the St. Jamer's Weekly Journal has most grossly scandalized the gentlemen of the Roebuck Society in his paper of last Saturday ; this is to satistie the world, that, before the aforesaid loyal body beat the butchers of Newgate Market to their heart's content, they assaulted them first for expressing their joy for the birth of the young Prince, on the 2nd of November last, as will be prov'd by affidavits that are now making in order to punish the ring- leaders of all Jacobite mobs." It is evident, however, that the proceedings of the mug-house societies began to be discounte- nanced by the less violent Whigs ; and nothing could be more calculated to keep up the ill-feelings which were tearing society to pieces, than the satirical processions that were paraded through London streets on every occasion that ottered itself. Several of these processions were prepared on a very large scale in 1717 and 1718, but they were forbidden by the authorities, and the effigies were exhibited privately at the Roebuck, or were made public only in printed descriptions. The Tories called loudly for the suppression of the mug-houses themselves, and several pamphlets lor and against them appeared in the earlier part of the year 1717. rosvenur Square, and in some oilier plac s al -n- tim line here described. FIBST EFFECTS OF THE BUBBLES. 45 charge it was built and is kept with, and the quantity of water it draws, its use and benefit is much beyond that."* All other trade but that of stock-jobbing was now neglected ; Exchange Alley was crowded from morning till night with per- sons of both sexes ; and society seemed for a moment turned upside-down. In the course of a few days, a multitude of indi- viduals were raised from indigence to a profusion of wealth, which many of them expended in luxurious living and in reck- less profligacy. In the park these upstart gentlemen mixed in their carriages with the aristocracy of the land ; but they were singled out as objects of insult and derision by the rabble, and at first the " stock-jobbers' " carriages seldom appeared in tin; *As the York Buildings Company's steam-engine appears not to have attracted much notice in the works on the history of this invention, which has created so extraordinary a revolution in modern society, it may not be thought uninteresting to add here a curious burlesque announcement of its fi-Tjf erection, with one or two other notices of it, taken, from, the journals ot the day. in the autumn of 1731, the supply of water to Mary-le-bone was discon- tinue.!, and the use of the engine was consequently discontinued at the name time. Read's Journal, in September 1731, announces briefly that "The York Buildings Company have given over working their fire-engine." The engine was, however, allowed to remain there for several years, though inactive, and seems to have been shewn as a curiosity. In an account of London published in All Alive and Mirry ; or the London Daily Pout, of Saturday, April 18, 1741, we have the following notice of it: " There is a famous machine in York Buildings, which was erected to force water by the means of fire, thro' pipes laid for that purpose into several parts of the town, and it was carry 'd on for some time to effect ; but the charge of working it, and some other reasons concurring, nuvie its proprie- tors, the York Buildings Company, lay aside the design ; and no doubt but the inhabitants in its neighbourhood are very glad of it ; for its working, which was by sea-coal, was attended with so much smoak, that it not only inu-t pollute the air thereabouts, but spoil the furniture." These apprehensions, which are amusing when we compare them with the present state of the metropolis, appear to have existed previous to the erec- tion of the engine, and form part of the foundation of the following jeu d'etprit. It is advertised as "published this day," price 6d., in the Daily Courant of December 14, 1725; but it is here reprinted from Read's Weekly Journal, of December 18, 1/25. " Tit* York Ruildinys Drmjons ; or, a full and true account of a moxt horrid and barbarous murder intended to be committed nejct Monday, on thf butties, goods, and name of the greatest part of his Majesty's lieije sub- jtrts dwelling and inhabiting between Temple /iar in the East, and St. James's in the Wen', and between Hunyerjord Market, in the South, ami St. Mary-la-bonr in the Xorth, by a set of evil- minded persons, who do assemble twice a week, to carry on their wicked pur-poses, in a jrrivate room over a stable by the Thames side, in a remote corner of the town. Now these conspirator* have puchatted two enormous dratroni from tho of L\ bia of such monstrous aizo lli.it the t.iil ot ..ne of 'cm in it inilo 4<5 FIRST EFFECTS OF THE BUBBLES. streets without being mobbed. A newspaper of the pth of July says satirically, " We are informed that, since the late hurly- burly of stock-jobbing, there has appeared in London two hun- dred new coaches and chariots, besides as many more now on the stocks in the coachmakers' yards ; above four thousand em- broidered coats ; about three thousand gold watches at the sides of their and their wives ; some few private acts of charity ; and about two thousand broken tradesmen." In the midst of and a half long,) which they have brought into this metropolis incognito, by the assistance of a conjurer, whom they have employed in that matter. " This conjurer, therefore, by the help of a hunting-whip that has a talis- man in the handle of it, contrived a means to run these dragons without paying any duty to the government ; for, by applying this talisman to the head of each dragon, he shut up all the life within one particular gland of the head, and then anatomically dissected the two monsters, so that they could be easily stowed in several ships, and be brought in as coming from different parts of the world. And accordingly most of the nerves and sinews came from Sweden ; the greatest part of the head from Norway, by the help of another conjurer who combined with the first ; the joints, and veins, and arteries were brought from Derbyshire ; the breast from Worces- tershire; and the back and wings from Kent, Berkshire, and Hertfordshire; the belly from Cornwall ; and the greatest part of the tail from the West country, except the thick end next to the body, which, together with the snout and teeth, came out of Sussex by sea, and passed at the Custom House for some outlandish curiosity, imported by some virtuosos of Great Britain. And you know natural knowledge is so much encouraged, that suck things never pay any duty, but pass unexamined ; witness Villette's great burning-glass, the Hugenian telescope, and the wax-work anatomies. Now, if there had been any astrologers among the Custom House officers, nothing of this would have happened ; for they are perfectly well acquainted with dragons' heads and dragons' tails. But what would you have men do that never saw a dragon in all their lives ? Since there never was any in this kingdom before, but one, and that was at Wantley, almost two hundred miles distant from London, who was killed by More, of More Hall, before he could come southward ; and he was but a little dragon in comparison, for he only devoured three children, whereas these dragons either have or will devour whole families. " But to return to our account. The conjuror and his abettors have concealed under a large tract of ground, the dreadful tail * of one of these monsters, and are now vivifying the whole animal by the reunion of its parts ; and diffusing its life from the glandula pinealis to the very extremities of the nostrils, wings, and tail. "On Monday, therefore, the zoth instant, at 14 minutes past 10 in the morning, a Lancashire wizzard, with long black hair and grim visage, will for some hours feed the eldest dragon with live coals ; and a Wel>hman, bred on the top of Penmaenmaur, will lay hold of the bridle to direct the motion of the creature. Then on a sudden will the monster clap his * This, of course, is an allusion to the wooden pipes, already mentioned, extending from the York Buildings to Mary-le-bone Fields, to convey the Thames water to the great reservoir there. FIEST EFFECTS OF THE BUBBLES. 47 these doings, about the 2oth of July, news arrived in London that, on the preceding Wednesday, the rjth, Law had been in- sulted by the populace of Paris, who were only hindered from destroying his house in the Rue Quinquenpoix by the timely arrival of the Swiss Guards; and that they had broken his coach, beaten his coachman, and obliged him to seek refuge in the Palais Royal. The great projector was now looked upon by the populace as the sole cause of the misery in which they found wings several times successively with prodigious force, and so terrible will be the noise thereof, that it will be heard as far as Calais, if the wind set right. All those who have musical ears, within the bills of mortality, will be struck deaf; those who have no ear will become deaf ; and all who were deaf before, will start up and run away. "The next disaster will be occasioned by the Welshman, who will cry 1 Boh ! ' to make the dragon drink, who immediately dipping his two heads into the Thames, will suck out thence such a prodigious quantity of water, that barges will never after be able to go through bridges ; the wharfs will become useless from the Steel Yard to Milibank ; and the tide will not rise high enough to fill the basin of a set of good-natured gentlemen who have been at immense pains to serve the new buildings with water. " The next calamity will be this, That, whereas, the dragon lives upon Newcastle and Scotch coal, (which, by the bye, will produce scarcity of coal, by reason of the great consumption,) and other bituminous substances, and is of himself of a huffing, snuffing temper, he will dart out of his nostrils perpendicularly up to the skies two such vast, dense, and opake columns of smoke, that those who live in the Borough will hardly see the sun at noon-day. Now this smoke being ponderous, will descend again upon all the neighbouring inhabitants ; being elastic, will spread and fall upon all the evergreens within ten miles of London ; and being fuliginous, will so discolor their hue, that it will puzzle a very nice botanist to determine concerning any leaf within that compass of ground whether it be of a subfuse or a downright piceous colour after this accident. Happy will then the ladies be who have papered up all their furniture before they went out of town ! Happy the stationers who have timely shut up their shops to preserve their paper ! And thrice happy the poor washer-women, who have closed up and pointed the garret- windows where they have hung up their linen clothes to dry. Besides all this, the sulphureous particles arising from the coals will be so pernicious to the lungs of all who suck them in, that they will break several blood- vessels with coughing. Add to all this, that upon the subsiding of this black pillar, the cities of London and Westminster will lose sight of one another, though in the clearest day ; so that nobody can possibly receive any benefit by this contrivance, unless it be the link-boys, who will be absolutely necessary to conduct people through the smoke. " Hut the worst consequence of all, and which I almost dread to relate, is, this dragon s way of poisoning. Through a long proboscis, something like an elephant's trunk, this creature can at pleasure filtrate and suck in all the venomous effluvia out of the air, water, and other fluids. And, therefore, to make up the desolation of this poor city, he will from the Thames in great abundance draw in all the fffltidocabbageous, deaddogitiou.i, deadcatitious, Fish-Btteethillious, Drurylanious, issuepUste- 48 FIRST EFFECTS OF THE BUBBLES. themselves involved, and he was obliged to give way so far to the General clamour as to resign his office of Comptroller of Finances. In November he was entirely deserted by the Regent; and, after securing his great fortune, retired into Italy. In August the stock of the various London companies was calculated to exceed the value of five hundred millions. The first great shock was given by the jealousy of the South Sea Company, who procured writs of scire, facias to be issued against some of the unauthorised bodies. The destruction of these ex- posed the fallacy of the whole, and recoiled almost immediately on the Inrger company itself. By the end of September, South Sea stock had sunk in value from 850 to 175 ; and thousands of families were reduced at one blow to absolute beggary ; " some of whom," to quote the words of a writer who lived at the time, rious, excrementitious, and all common-horeitious particles therein con- tained from time to time ; and having therewith filled his stomach, this xtygious compound will pass the pylorus, and being carried along the viscera by the peristaltic motion, will issue out at the anus, (which in this animal is in the last joint of the tail) with great stench, in vast quantities, into a large receptacle prepared by the aforesaid conjuror for receiving and containing this hellish liquor. Now, as this fluid is always to run in, and never to go out, it is evident to all chemists and naturalists, and several other ingenious gentlemen besides, that there must be an intestine motion, because the fluid stands still, and this intestine motion will cause a fermentation, which fermentation will cast out undequaque such pestiferous streams and vapours, as will depopulate all the whole neighbourhood in such a manner that grass will grow in Queen Anne Street, Chandos Street, Mortimer Street, and all the adjacent streets, till the genius of architecture comes to the relief of the desolate place. And if it should so happen, that, by the violent motion of the beast, it should receive any wounds in its tail, from every wound will issue with impetuosity rivers of this abominable liquor, which will inundate and render impassable the streets, drown all those that come within its vortex, and such as venture to look out of their chamber-windows will be suffocated with the putrid vapour. " To conclude my dismal story : I must let the world know that these conspirators are enemies to the souls as well as the bodies of all persona they can have any influence over, by setting up a new kind of Popery, and have already persuaded several families to worship these dragons. Among other things, they have a ceremony much like Transubatantiation ; for, by the mixture of Ceres and N'eritune, (and what is the Popish Host but bread and water ?) they huve contrived a consiyillated wafer, which turns paper into money. " Now to give my reader a little hope, before I quit this melancholy tale, 1 must acquaint him that a set of honest and brave gentlemen intend to prosecute these vile men, who will find themselves deceived in trusting to the Toleration Act; for that act allows of no image- worship within ten miles of London, except it be in a foreign amb r's chapel. " Written by a club of ingenious gentlemen. " Anodine Necklace, Secretary." THE SOUTH SEA BALLAD. 49 " after so long living in splendour, were not able to stand the shock of poverty and contempt, and died of broken hearts ; others withdrew to remote parts of the world, and never re- turned." In the month of August, even before the issuing of the writs otscire facias, people began to foresee the catastrophe, and somo prudent men withdrew, after having realized great fortunes. Towards the end of August "the bubbles" were turned to ridi- cule in a multitude of songs and satirical pieces. In the first days of September appeared the celebrated South Sea ballad, which was sung about the streets of London for months to- gether, and helped not a little to bring stock-jobbing into dis- credit. A SOUTH SEA BALLAD ; OR, MERRY REMARKS UPON EXCHANGE ALLEY BUBBLES. To a new tune called "The Grand Elixir ; or, the Philosopher's Stone Discovered." I. " In London stands a famous pile And near that pile an alley, Where merry crowds for riches toil, And Wisdom stoops to Folly. Here sad and joyful, high and low, Court Fortune for her graces ; And as she smiles or frowns, they show Their gestures and grimaces. i. "Here stars and garters do appear, Among our lords the rabble ; To buy and sell, to see and hear, The Jews and Gentiles squabble. Here crafty courtiers are too wise For those who trust to Fortune ; They see the cheat with clearer eyes, Who peep behind the curtain. 3- " Our greatest ladies hither come, And ply in chariots daily ; Oft pawn their jewels for a sum To venture in the Alley. Young harlots, too, from Drury Lane, Approach the 'Change in coaches, To fool away the gold they gain By their impure debauches. 4- 11 Longheads may thrive by sober rules, Because they think, and drink not ; 50 THE SOUTH SEA BALLAD. But headlong are our thriving fools, Who only drink and think not. The lucky rogues, like spaniel dogs, Leap into South Sea Water, And there they fish for golden frogs, Not caring what comes a'ter. 5- " 'Tis said that alchemists of old Could turn a brazen kettle, Or leaden cistern, into gold, That noble tempting metal ; But if it here may be allow'd To bring in great and small things, Our cunning South Sea, like the gods, Turns nothing into all things ! 6. "What need have we of Indian wealth, Or commerce with our neighbours ? Our constitution is in health, And riches crown our labours. Our South Sea ships have golden shrouds. They bring us wealth, 'tis granted, But lodge their treasure in the clouds, To hide it till it's wanted. 7- " Britain, bless thy present state, Thou only happy nation ; So oddly rich, so madly great, Since bubbles came in fashion I Successful rakes exert their pride, And count their airy millions ; Whilst homely drabs in coaches ride, Brought up to town on pillions. 8. "Few men, who follow reason's rules, Grow fat with South Sea diet ; Young rattles and unthinking fools, Are those that flourish by it. Old musty jades, and pushing bkdes, Who've least consideration, Grow rich apace ; whilst wiser heads Are struck with admiration. 9- ** A race of men, who t' other day Lay crush'd beneath disasters, And now by stock brought into play, And made our lords and masters. But should our South Sea Babel fall, What numbers would be frowning ! The losers then must ease their gall By hanging or by drowning. EXPLOSION OF THE BUBBLES. 51 10. " Five hundred millions, notes and bonds, Our stocks are worth in value ; But neither lie in goods or lands, Or money, let me tell you. Yet though our foreign trade is lost, Of mighty wealth we vapour ; Whea all the riches that we boast Consists in scraps of paper ! " From the month of October to the end of the year, songs, and squibs, and pamphlets of all descriptions, on the misfortunes occasioned by the explosion of the bubble system, became ex- ceedingly numerous. Two dramatic pieces, " The Broken Stock-Jobbers," a farce, " as lately acted by his Majesty's sub- jects in Exchange Alley," and "South-Sea; or, The Biter Bit," a farce, are advertised in the month of October. The general feeling against the directors was becoming so strong in the month of November, that we are told it had become a practice among the ladies, when in playing at cards they turned up a knave, to cry, " There is a director for you !" The period of the South Sea bubble is that in which political caricatures began to be common in England ; for they had be- fore been published at rare intervals, and partook so much of the character of emblems, that they are not always very easy to be understood. Read's Weekly Journal of November i, 1718, gives a caricature against the Tories, engraved on wood, which is called " an hieroglyphic," so little was the real nature of a caricature then appreciated. Another fault under which these earlier caricatures labour is that of being extremely elaborate. The earliest English caricature on the South Sea Company is advertised in the Post Boy of June 21, 1720, under the title of " The Bubblers bubbled ; or, The Devil take the Hindmost." It no doubt related to the great rush which was made to sub- scribe to the numerous companies afloat in that month." I have not met with a copy of it, but in the advertisement it is stated to be represented " by a great number of figures. In the adver- tisement of another caricature, on the 2pth of February in this year, called " The World in Masquerade," it is set forth, as one of its great recommendations, that it was " represented in nigh eighty figures." In France and in Holland (where the bubble- mania had thrown everything into the greatest confusion), the number of caricatures published during the year 1720 was very considerable. In the latter country, a large number of these caricatures, as well as many satirical plays and songs, were collected together and published in a folio volume, which is still a 5 CARICATURES ON THE BUBBLES. not uncommon, under the title, " Het groote Tafereel der Dwaasheid " (The gteat Picture of Folly). The greater por- tion of these foreign caricatures relate to Law and his Missis- sippi scheme. In one of these, a number of persons of both sexes, and of all ages and conditions in society, are represented acting the part of Atlas, each supporting a globe on his shoulders. Law, the Atlas who supported the world of paper, V Atlas actieux de papier, as he is termed in the French de- scription of the plate, bears his globe but unsteadily, and is obliged to call in Hercules to his aid. A MODERN ATLAS. " Roi Atlas, h6 ! pourquoi te fatiguer ainsi? Permets qu'Hercule vienne, et te donne assistance, Et t'aide a soutenir ton charge d'importance. Quoi qu'on dit c'est papier ou du vent, aujourd'hui, II n'y a en ce temps d'espece si pe'sante ; Puis qu'en troc et trafic il pese plus que d'or." So little point is there often in these caricatures, and so great appears to have been the call for them in Holland, that people seemed to have looked up old engravings, designed originally for a totally different purpose, and, adding new inscriptions and new explanations, they were published as caricatures on the bubbles. These betray themselves sometimes by the costume. A large wood-cut which represents the meeting of a King and a nobleman in the court of a palace, attended by a crowd of courtiers in the costume of the days of Henry IV. or Louis XIII., is thus made to represent the crowding of the stock- jobbers to the Rue Quinquenpoix. In the same manner a large plate, which seems originally to have been an allegorical repre- CARICATURES ON THE BUBBLES. 53 eentation of the battle between Carnival and Lent (a rather popular subject at an earlier period), is here given under the new title of " The Battle between the good-living Bubble-lords and approaching Poverty," (Stryd tuszen de smullende Eubbel- Heeren en de aanstaande Armoede.) The best of these caricatures is a large engraving by Picart, which appears in the Dutch volume, with explanations in French and Dutch, and which was re-engraved with English descriptions and applications in London. It is a general satire on the madness which characterized the memorable year 1720. " Qui," says the inscription, "Qui le croira ? qui 1'eut jamais pense" ? Qu'en un siecle si sage un systeme insense Fit du commerce un jeu de la Fortune ! Et se jeu pernicieux, Ensorcelant jeunes et vieux, Rempllt tous lea esprits d'une yvresse commune." Fortune is here driven in her car by Folly, the car being drawn by the personifications of the principal companies who began the pernicious trade of stock-jobbing, as the Mississippi, represented with a wooden leg ; the South Sea, with a sore leg, and the other bound with a ligament ; the Bank, treading under foot a serpent, &c. The agents of some of the larger com- panies are turning the wheels of the car, and are represented with foxes' tails, " to show their policy and cunning." The spokes of the wheels are inscribed with the names of different companies, which, as the car moves forward, are alternately up and down ; while books of merchandise, crushed and torn beneath them, represent the de- struction of trade and commerce. In the clouds the Devil appears making bubbles of soap, which mingle with the " actions " and other things (good and bad) that Fortune is distributing to the crowd. " Those," it is ad- ded, " that will give themselves the trouble of examining the print, may discover many things which are not here explained, in order that the curious may have the pleasure of having some- r/oi BI.E H'-LIJ UT. 54 CARICATUEES ON THE BUBBLES. tiling to guess at /" In fact there are a number of different groups in the picture which are not described. On one side, one of the fox-tailed gentlemen is whispering into the ear of a simple buyer of actions, while a roguish lad is picking his pockets behind. Those who brought their money into Ex- change Alley were exposed to every description of robbery. Near these, in the original print, a handsome young damsel is thrown by the sudden frown of Fortune into the longing arms of an old and ill-favoured but more fortunate worshipper of the capricious goddess. " Quand on est jeune et belle, et qu'on a le malheur D'avoir perdu son bien dans un jeu si funeste, Gare qu'un billet au porteur Ne fasse encore perdre le reste !" We are well assured by the writers of the time, that the profligacy which followed this mad gambling was almost in- credible. On the other side of the picture is a group occu- pied in buying and selling stock : the seller appears ea- ger for the purchase-money, which the buyer is counting out upon a block, while a Jew broker transacts the affair. The word "transfer" is in- scribed on the block in the English print. The car of Fortune proceedsfrom a large coffee-house, over the door of which, in the original plate, we read the word " Quinquenpoix ;" in place of which the English copy has " Jonathan's," which was the great place of resort in London for bubblers and bubbled. At the other extremity of the picture, the infatuated crowd is hurrying forward to fill the three places of its final destination, the mad-house, the poor-house, and the hospital. The latter is called, in the English print, " The House of Fools ;" but, in several particulars of this kind, as well as in artistical execution, the original engraving of Picart is much superior to the English copy. Folly is represented with the spacious hoop-petticoat, patches, and other extravagant fashions of the day, a true female exquisite of the year 1/20. The Post-Boy of October 20, 1720 contains an advertise- TRANSFER. POLITICAL PL A TING- CARDS. 55 FOLLY IN THE GA.BB OF 1720. ment of the publication " this day " of " a pack of bubble cards," each containing an engraving relating to one of the numerous companies formed or projected during the summer, and accompa- nied with an appropriate epigram, "the lines by the. author of the ' South Sea Bal- lad,' and the Tippling Phi- losopher.'" In the Weekly Packet and in Mist's Weekly Journal of December 10, " A new Pack of Stock-jobbing Cards" is announced as pub- lished that day, with lines by the same author. The price of each pack is stated to be two shillings and sixpence. The notion of political playing- cards was not altogether new ; one, at least, had appeared in the latter times of the Commonwealth, and in the reign of Charles II. a pack of such cards had been published on the celebrated Popish Plot, which had caused almost as great an excitement through- out the country as the bubbles of the year 1720. A set of bubble cards had also been published in this latter year in Hol- land ; but whether the Dutch took the hint from the English, or the English from the Dutch, it is not easy to determine. These packs of South Sea cards are preserved in the collection of Mr. Burke. Each of the " bubble cards " contains an en- graving representing the object of one of the numerous com- panies that grew up round the greater bubble of the South Sea scheme, with an epigram in four lines, which is frequently quaint and amusing. The ten of hearts has a ship freighting with timber, in allusion to the company for exporting timber from Germany, and the lines, " You that are rich, and hasty to be poor, Buy timber export from the German shore ; For gallowses, built up of foreign wood, If rightly us'd, may do 'Change Alley good." The object of another company was the " curing tobacco for snuff;" and the card represents two negroes and their overseer passing the snuff through a sieve, whilst their eyes very unequi- vocally sutler from the dust : 56 STOCK-JOBBING CARDS. " Here slaves for snuff are sifting Indian weed, Whilst their o'erseer does the riddle feed ; The dust arising gives their eyes much trouble, To show their blindness that espouse the bubble." The " stock-jobbing " cards are more decidedly caricatures? than the others, and they deal more especially with the doings of the bubblers and their dupes, than with the bubbles themselves. On the three of clubs we see two stock-jobbers inventing poli- tical news, and resolving to proclaim the birth of a young Pre- tender, or rather two, from the marriage of the old one with the Polish Princess Sobieski, as the news most likely to afi'ect the value of the funds. " Two jobbers for the day invent a lie, And broach the same to low'r the stocks thereby. One says the Pole 's delivered ; t' other swears Sl.e's brought to bed of two pretending heirs." The king of clubs gives a receipt against bankruptcy ; a trades- man in distress receives counsel from his friend : " I'd advise you to buy stock, and take it up in fourteen days ; it may chance to rise, but if it falls you can but then go off." The tradesman takes the hint : " 'Tis true, one breaking will serve for all ; but if I succeed, 'twill make me a man ;" and it appears he is successful. "A bending tradesman to retrieve his fortune, Buys stock to take it in a fortnight certain ; It rises greatly by the time of taking, And thus the buyer saves himself from breaking." The nine of hearts tells a different story : "A merchant liv'd of late in reputation. But bilk'd by stock, like thousands in the nation, Goes to the Mint, his bad success bemoaning, To shun his ruin, saves himself by breaking." In another card, three bubble directors advise with their lawyer: one says to his legal adviser, " Sir, if you can evade this act, you and I may ride in our coaches." " My advice," answers the lawyer, " is, get what money you can, give me some, and make off with the rest." The other two bubblers are consulting in a corner of the room on the most effectual way of securing the zeal of the lawyer in their cause : " Tell him he shall be a director," says the one. The verses on the card are not worth quoting. On the three of diamonds "A lady pawns her jewels by her maid, And in declining stock presumes to trade; Till in South Sea she drowns her coin, And now in Bristol stones is glad to ENGLISH CAEICATURES. 57 The greater number of the English caricatures on the follies of the year 1720 were published in the year following. The London Journal, April 22, 1721, announces, as "Just publish'd, six fine prints, representing the humours of the French, Dutch, and English bubblers and stock-jobbers ; with variety of hu- mours," &c. These probably included the two " Bubblers' Medleys ;" and two equally well-known plates, entitled " The Bubbler's Mirrour," in one of which is represented a figure joyful for the rise of stock, and in the other a man in deep mourning lamenting its fall. Both of these latter prints are surrounded by lists of the bubbles, accompanied with the same epigrams which appear on the bubble cards. The English caricatures of this time are but poor imitations of the foreign ones ; in fact, the taste for them seems to have been imported from abroad, and the South Sea disaster must be looked upon as the beginning of the rage for caricatures which appeared in this country a few years after. It must not be forgotten, that Hogarth's first political caricature related to the bubbles of 1720, and was published in 1721. The misery produced by these bubbles in the winter of 1/20, both in England and on the Continent, can with difficulty be conceived. Yet, after the space of a century, the same folly re- appeared in the mania of 1825, and some of the same bubbles were revived ; but their effects at the latter period were small in comparison to those of 1720. A German medal in the collec- tion of Mr. Haggard, struck probably towards the end of the year last mentioned, represents on one side the momentarj- pros- perity of the stock-jobbers, and on the reverse the frightful catastrophe. Suicide by hanging and drowning, hasty flight, and despair, as here represented, were the share of hundreds. The cla- mour of the sufferers overcame all other appeals to the Govern- ment during the year 1721. A searching examination by a com- mittee of the House of Commons exposed to public view many ini- quitous transactions ; and the general dissatisfaction was in- creased by the belief that not only the ministers of the Crown, but more e.-pecially the King's mistresses and his greedy Ger- THE END OF UUIiBLISd. 58 FLIGHT OF KNIGHT. man followers, had received bribes in the first instance for procuring the passing of the South Sea bill, and had afterwards made great profits by stock-jobbing. The South Sea directors became objects of hatred and persecution, and their property was confiscated and themselves imprisoned. The ministry was broken up ; and, at the beginning of April, remodelled under the guidance of Mr. Walpole, who, though accused of having pro- fitted largely by trading in stock himself, was the only man capable at this moment of bringing a remedy to the evil. Robert Knight, the treasurer of the South Sea Company, after undergoing a partial examination, fled (with the book which, it was believed, contained the greatest secrets of the late transac- tions) to France, and thence to Brabant, where he was arrested and confined in the castle at Antwerp. There he remained during the greater part of the year, for the States of Brabant refused to deliver him up to the English Government. It was commonly believed that the flight of the South Sea treasurer had been contrived by greater persons ; that the attempts to bring him back to England were not made in earnest ; and that his arrest in Brabant was a mere act of collusion, the whole being a screen to hide the conduct of great persons about Court, whom it was essential to keep from public view. This screen, and Knight's escape from England, began to be the subject of a variety of caricatures after the month of April, 1721. In one of these the fugitive is represented as taking refuge in the infernal regions, the fittest receptacle, as it was represented, for so de- tested an individual. In another, entitled " The Brabant Screen," Knight is figured in his travelling garb, receiving his de- spatches, which are given to him from behind thescreen by the King's chief mistress, or left-hand wife, the Duchess of Kendal, who was said to have received enormous sums from the South Sea Company, and who chiefly was supposed to hinder Knight from being delivered to justice. On the other side of the screen, a paper lying on a table bears the words, " Patience, time, and money set everything to rights ; " insinuating that Knight had been designedly KNIGHT 8 DEPARTURE. A NEW PARLIAMENT. 59 sent out of the way until the public feeling could be appeased. Underneath the engraving are some verses, the spirit of which will be sufficiently shewn by the first half-dozen : " In vain Great Britain sues for Knight's discharge, In rain we hope to see that wretch at large ; If traitors here the villain there secure, Our ills must all increase, our woes be sure. Should he- return, the screen would useless be, And all men then the mystery would see."* The wise measures of Walpole gradually alleviated the evils which the South Sea affair had inflicted on society, although they were felt heavily for some time ; and the name of stock- jobber has never entirely thrown off the weight of popular odium which it contracted on this occasion. The effect upon politics was, however, much less than the opponents of King George's government hoped for and reckoned upon : but a new subject of agitation was now approaching, which helped in some measure to make people forget the former. The first Parliament of George I. would naturally have expired in 1717; but the ministers, who" had already experienced on two memorable occasions the danger of general elections in a moment of excitement, and imagined that there was much then to be dreaded from the intrigues of the Jacobites, had obtained in 1716 an act of Parliament repealing the Triennial Act, and fixing the legal duration of a Parliament to seven years, and the bill was made to apply to the Parliament then in existence. By this alteration King George's first Parliament was to end with the year 1/21 ; and the elections, to all appearance, would fall amid the still existing excitement of the misfortunes of the bubble explosion. We find, however, that this subject of com- plaint was very little agitated in the elections which took place in the spring of 1722. The chief attack upon the Court party was made by exciting the old mob-prejudices against the Com- monwealth and Dissenters. The Tories accused the late Parlia- ment of a design to constitute themselves another " Long " Parliament, published lists of those who voted for and against the repeal of the Triennial Act, and stigmatized the former by the old and unpopular title of the " Rump." Pamphlets on the The caricatures mentioned above, and one or (wo others on the same subject, are preserved in tl/e collection of Mr. Burke and Mr. Hawkins. The print representing the entiance of Knight into the infernal regions was probably published later in the year, for a caricature entitled "Robin's Flight ; or, the ghost of the late S. S. treasurer ferry'd into hell," is advertised as just published iii a newspaper of Sept 23, 1721. 60 PREPARATIONS FOR THE ELECTIONS. misdeeds of the Rump Parliament were diligently spread abroad ; and in some places the old custom of burning rumps was again practised by the mob, whose usual cry was " Up with the Church, and down with the Rump !" But Wai pole brought now into action what yould seem to have been a new system of electioneering, by which he gained a signal victory over his opponents, who still placed their depend- ence on the old plan of raising a popular excitement, which under other circumstances had proved so eminently successful in Queen Anne's time, and had embarrassed the Government even under the disadvantages to the Tories which accompanied the change of the reigning family. Long before the dissolution of the Parliament, the Government candidates declared themselves openly, and personally canvassed the electors ; and no expedient was left untried to secure their votes. The Tory papers com- plain bitterly, that, on this occasion, noblemen and gentlemen condescended to solicit votes with an undignified familiarity. We cannot now be otherwise than amused at complaints like the following, published in a Tory paper, Applebee's Original Weekly Journal of January 6, 1722: " Altho" we think the appointing general meetings of the gentlemen of counties, for making agreements for votes for the election of a new Par- liament before the old Parliament is expir'd, is a most scan- dalous method and an evident token of corruption, yet we find it daily practic'd, and, which is worse, publickly own'd, par- ticularly in the county of Surrey, where the very names of the candidates are publish'd, and the votes of the freeholders openly sollicited in the publick prints. The like is now doing, or pre- paring to be done, for Buckinghamshire ; and we are told, like- wise, that it is doing for other counties also." In fact, this deliberate preparing of votes was eminently calculated to coun- teract the sudden influence of popular agitation and mob excite- ment throughout the country; and aware, by what had so recently passed, of the power of money at that time, Walpole is said to have practised on the present occasion a very extensive system of bribery. When the Parliament was dissolved in March, a host of pamphlets were sent into the world, as had been done before on similar occasions, to influence the votes of electors ; and the old system of getting up mobs was again resorted to. These mobs, in some instances, beat and kept away those who were on their way to vote for the opposite party : in some cases they carried them off, and locked them up till the election was over. In several places, especially at Coventry, fearful riots took place. ELECTIONEERING CARICATURES. 61 In London there was much agitation ; and, on this occasion, Westminster began those scenes of uproar which were afterwards so often repeated. But the influence of the mob diminished before Walpole's foresight and his gold, and in the new Parlia- ment the Government obtained an overwhelming majority. The opposition was reduced to a state of weakness, in which it could only vent its spleen in political squibs and caricatures. In the midst of the elections, but when the result was no longer doubtful, on the 3ist of March, an advertisement in the Tory Post-Soy announces as just published, price sixpence each, two prints, under the titles of " The Prevailing Candidate ; or, the election carried by bribery and the D 1 :" and " Britannia stript by a Villain ; to which is added, the true phiz of a late member." The first of these only appears now to be known :* the right-hand side is occupied by a screen of seven folds, which are intended to represent the seven almost barren years of the late Parliament ; while on the left appears the group here repre- AS ELECTION EPISODE. ented, which is explained by the verses underneath. This is the earliest caricature on elections with which I am acquainted. 14 Here's a minion sent down to a corporate town, In hopes to be newly elected ; This rare print, which is one of the best of the caricatures of the reign of George the First, U in tl.e collection of Mr. Hawkins. 6a MOVEMENTS OF THE PRETENDER. By his prodigal show, you may easily know To the Court he is truly affected. " He 'as a knave by the hand, who has power to command All the votes in the corporation ; Shoves a sum in his pocket, the D 1 cries ' Take it, 'Tis all for the good of the nation !' " The wife, standing by, looks a little awry At the candidate's way of addressing ; But a priest, stepping in avers bribery no sin, Since money 's a family blessing. " Say the boys, 'Ye sad rogues, here are French wooden brogues, To reward your vile treacherous knavery ; For such traitors as you are the rascally crew That betray the whole kingdom to slavery.' " The more violent Tories, in their despair, seem to have been thrown again upon dangerous undertakings. We have seen, that, even in the midst of the bubble mania, the movements of the Pretender were considered sufficient to affect the public funds ; and the eyes of Englishmen were constantly fixed upon him in his retreat at Rome. The joy of the Jacobites was great, when they learnt, at the end of the year 1720, that his Polish wife had given birth to a son, a young Pretender, destined to be brought on the stage when the little energy ever possessed by his father was gone. They hoped much from the dissatisfaction and sufferings caused by the disasters of the South Sea scheme, and they had been signally disappointed in the result of the elections. The excitement of these had scarcely subsided, when the English Government received from Prance information of a formidable conspiracy at home against King George ; and it was discovered that the Pretender had left Rome, and that the Duke of Ormond was on his way from Madrid to be prepared on the coast of Biscay for a descent on that of England. A camp was immediately formed in Hyde Park, to protect the King and the metropolis, from which latter all Papists, or reputed Papists, were warned to depart, by a royal proclamation issued on the pth of May. At the same time we trace attempts to raise a new feeling among the mob in favour of the exiled family ; and it is announced, in Read's Weekly Journal of May 26, that " The messenger of the press has caused fourteen persons to be sent to the House of Correction, for crying about the city scan- dalous and traiterous songs." In perilous undertakings like this, caricatures were circulated on medals, rather than in prints, and we have such a medal struck at this time, with a head of the Pretender on the obverse, and the legend UNICA SALUS, and on the reverse, under the legend QUID GBAYITTS CAPTA, a distant ATTERBURY'S PLOT. 63 view of London, with Britannia weeping in the foreground, and before her face the horse of Hanover trampling upon her lion and unicorn. The Jacobites pretended that the nation had been enslaved by the Court in- fluence in the elections ; and on the 2oth of September, long after the English conspirators had been seized, the Pretender issued a mad declaration, which was printed and industriously distributed in England, in which he dwelt especially on the pretended violation of the freedom of voting. The declaration was ordered by the British Parliament, which was then assembled, to be burnt by the hands of the hangman. A bishop was the principal conspirator in the Jacobite plot of 1722. Atterbury, of Rochester, was a minister of the Crown under the brief premiership of Bolingbroke in the few last days of the reign of Queen Anne ; on whose death he alone had been bold enough to propose that they should proclaim the son, or reputed son, of James II. as her successor to the throne. He had been ever since noted for his disaffection to the Hanoverian government ; and now he seems to have rashly embraced the hope that a few troops under the Duke of Ormond, landed on the southern coast, would be enough to overthrow it. At the end of May, several inferior, but active, conspirators, were taken into custody; they were, a nou-juring clergyman named Kelly, an Irish Catholic priest of the name of Neynoe, Layer, (a young barrister of the Temple,) and another Irishman, (a Jesuit namde Plunket.) Their examinations led to the arrest of Bishop Atterbury, who was committed a close prisoner to the Tower on the 24th of August. The High-Church party were furious at what they considered the sacrilege of imprisoning a bishop ; and the Tories declared publicly that the whole plot was a fiction, that the Pretender had never quitted Rome, and that his party had no designs against King George's government. This was soon contradicted by the Pretender's own declaration ; and documents which have of late years come to light destroy all doubts that might have been entertained of the guilt of Atter- bury. In the beginning of 1723 Layer was brought to his trial, andwas convicted of having enlisted men for the Pretender's service, in order to raise a new rebellion : he was executed at Tyburn. The Tories still ridiculed the plot, and as late as the 6 4 THE PLOT DEFEATED. i6th of April, 1723, we learn from the Daily Journal, that " diligent search is making after the contrivers and disperscrs of a seditious copy of verses burlesquing the discovery of the late wicked conspiracy, * and the methods taken for punishing the conspirators." In May, however, Atterbury was brought to trial before the House of Lords ; a bill of pains and penalties was passed, by which he was deprived of his bishopric, and banished the kingdom ; and on the i8th of June he was put on board a King's ship and conveyed to France, where he at once entered the service of the Pretender. A medal was now struck to commemorate the defeat of the design, which the Pretender's medal above mentioned was intended to forward. On the obverse, the conspirators are represented as seated round a table in deep consultation, the Bishop presiding and delivering a paper to them. Above is a legend intimating the determination to restore the exile to his lost crown DECBETUM EST, BEGNO BEITO BESTITUATUB ABACTTJS the numeral letters of which make the date 1722, as that in which the plot was carried on. On the reverse of the medal, the eye of Providence never asleep, darts its lightnings among the conspirators, casting the Bishop's mitre from his head, and striking apparently with death another conspirator seated on the right, probably intended to represent the Templar, Layer. The inscription on this side is, CON- 8PIBATE, APERIT DEUS, [oculum], ET VOS FULMINE PULSAT, the numeral letters of which make the date 1723, the year in which the plotters were convicted and punished. At the foot of the model, obverse and reverse, is the inscription CONSPIBATIO BBITANNICA.* * This medal as well as the Pretender's medal mentioned before, is in the collection of Mr. Haggard. THE PLOT DEFEATED. 6$ From this time the government of King George was relieved from most of its uneasiness. The ministers, strong in their par- liamentary majorities, paid little heed to the clamours of the opposition ; trade went on flourishing, and the Pretender was no longer in a position to give alarm. The greatest subjects of political agitation were an Irish squabble about half-pence, or a Scottish riot against taxes. Even before the elections, the London newspapers had found leisure to dispute about the murder of Julius Caesar and the patriotism of Brutus ; and for several years after the bitterness of party feeling appears to have cast itself chiefly into the ranks of literature and science. 66 CHAPTER III. GEORGE I. AND II. Literature Debused by the Rage for Politics The Stage Operas, Mas- querades, and Pantomimes Heidegger and his Singers Orator Henley The "Beggar's Opera" "The Dunciad" Continued Popularity of the Opera Political use of the Stage Act for Licensing Plays Attacks upon Pope New Edition of the "Dunciad." rpHE agitation produced by the year of bubbles was followed by loud outcries against the alarming increase of immorality and profligacy, the debased character of the stage, and the low state of literature, all of which were made alternately the watchwords of political strife. A long-established opinion, per- haps not altogether just, has fixed upon the reign of Queen Anne as the Augustan age of English literature ; but the few pure models of English composition which that age produced were scattered stars among a countless multitude of unworthy scribblers, whose fame was in subsequent times embodied in the name of Qrubb Street, and who, from a variety of causes, were gradually driving the more classic writers out of the field. The first kings of the Hanoverian dynasty had no love for letters ; and it happened that one or two of the most distinguished literary names belonged to the party in opposition to their government. Those only could live by their writings who would throw themselves into the troubled sea of party, or who would pander to the depraved taste of the mob of readers ; or, in other words, who would be the slaves of the newspapers or of the booksellers. The party newspapers were increasing daily in scurrility as well as in number ; but, instead of the wit and elegance of the Spectators and Tattlers, they were filled with calumny and defamation, or with wearisome tales of gallantry, varied only by occasional and not unfrequent patches of indecent ribaldry. It is clear, indeed, that the national taste had become as vulgar as the national manners, and as corrupt as the princi- ples of a large majority of the public men of that period. The works which received the greatest encouragement were scanda- lous memoirs, secret history surreptitiously obtained and sent forth under fictitious names, (such as the books which came STATE OF LITERATURE. 67 froja the pens of Eliza Hay wood, Mrs. Manley, and other equally shameless female writers, and from the press of Edmund Curll,) and ill-disguised obscenity. A great number of the low political writers of the day were well paid with the government money. The secret committee appointed to inquire into the sins of Walpole's administration, after he had retired from office, reported that no less than fifty thousand and seventy-seven pounds eighteen shillings were paid to authors and printers of newspapers in the course of ten years, between February 10, 1731, and February 10, 1741. Of this, it appears, by the report just quoted, that William Arnall, a very active political writer, received in the course of four years, " for Free Britons and writing," eleven thousand pounds out of the Treasury. After the employment of writing for Government, the most profitable was that of writing for the stage. The drama was suffering perhaps more than any other class of literature by the debasement of public taste, although it had certainly been raised in moral character since the days of Charles II. Under his reign there had been two sets of actors, known as " the King's" and " the Duke's ;" but, in 1690, these were united in one com- pany, who, under one patent, had their house in Drury Lane. Internal dissension, however, soon led to disunion in the com- pany ; and the seceders, under Betterton, obtained from King William a licence to act independently, and a theatre was built for them in Lincoln's Inn Fields. There was, of course, a zealous rivalry between the two parties, which in the opinion of Colley Gibber, led each to seek patronage by yielding to the taste of the mob, instead of being able to guide it : but after the experience of another century, we have every reason to dis- agree in the opinion formed by Gibber on this tendency. In 1706 a new and " stately " theatre was provided in the Hay- market for the Lincoln's Inn company, built under the direction of Sir John Vanbrugh ; and an attempt was made to effect a reunion between the two companies, but without effect. The Haymarket theatre, known under Anne as the Queen's, and under her successors as the King's theatre, was found not to answer well its original intention, and it was afterwards appro- priated to the Italian Opera ; for, as Gibber tells us, " not long before this time the Italian Opera began first to steal into England, but in as rude a disguise and unlike itself as possible ; in a lame, hobbling translation into our own language, with false quantities, or metre out of measure to its original notes, sung by our own unskilful voices, with graces misapplied to almost F 2 68 HEIDEGGER AND THE MASQUERADES. every sentiment, and with action lifeless and unmeaning through every character." After a number of vicissitudes, the licensed companies of actors remained in nearly the same position towards each other under George the First. " His Majesty's company of come- dians," under the joint management of Booth, Gibber, and Wilks, held Drury Lane ; the theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields had been rebuilt for the opposition company under Kich : and the King's theatre in the Haymarket was devoted exclusively to the Italian Opera, under the management of the celebrated John James Heidegger.* Not long before the rise of the South Sea scheme, masquerades were introduced at the Opera House as a new attraction to popularity ; and in a short time they became, under Heidegger's management, the rage of the town. Every one seemed to relish the momentary saturnalia in which all ranks and classes, in outward disguise at least, mixed together in in- discriminate confusion ; where, to use the words of a contempo- rary writer, " Fools, dukes, rakes, cardinals, fops, Indian queens, Belles in tye-wigs, and lords in Harlequins, Troops of right honourable porters come, And garter'd small coal- merchants crowd the room ; Valets stuck o'er with coronets appear, Lacquey's of state, and footmen with a star ; Sailors of quality with judges mix, And chimney-sweepers drive their coach and six : Statesmen, so used at Court the mask to wear, Now condescend again to use it here ; Idiots turn conjurers, and courtiers clowns, And sultans drop their handkerchiefs to nuns." The masquerade soon became more than a figurative leveller of society ; for sharpers, and women of ill-repute, and others, gained admission, and the consequence was nightly scenes of robbery, and quarrels, and scandalous licentiousness. The general agreement of contemporary writers on this subject can leave no doubt on our minds of the evil effects of masquerades on the morality of the day. The South Sea convulsion had hardly subsided, when a general outcry was heard against the alarming increase of atheism, profaneness, and immorality, and an attempt was made to suppress them by Act of Parliament, but the bill for that purpose was not allowed to pass. The * There was also a " new theatre over against the Opera, which, in the latter years of the reign of George I., was held by a party of French players ; and an unlicensed company of English players acted in a theatre in Goodman's Fields. PRESENTMENT AGAINST HEIDEGGER. 69 dangerous effects of masquerades were particularly insisted upon ; and they soon became the object of severe attacks in the news- papers, and in satirical as well as serious pamphlets. In spite, however, of all that could be done, these proscribed entertain- ments continued to flourish ; and for successive years the most prominent advertisements in the daily papers were those an- nouncing where masquerade dresses of every variety were to be lent for the night on reasonable terms. On Monday, January 6, 1726, the Bishop of London preached in Bow Church, Cheap- side, before the Society for the lleformation of Manners, a ser- mon directed especially against masquerades, which made a con- siderable sensation, and so far drew the attention of Government to the subject, that it was followed by a royal proclamation against the favourite entertainments of the town, the only result of which was, that they were in future carried on under the Italian title of ridottos, or the English one of balls ; and, in order to satisfy in some measure the scruples of the authorities, the public advertisements of each ball contained a paragraph stating that guards were stationed within and without to prevent " all disorders and indecencies." The Middlesex grand juries on several occasions presented these masquerades as public nui- sances, and complained of the manner in which the King's orders had been evaded, but without any permanent effect. George the Second was warmly attached to masquerades, as well as to the Opera, and he not unfrequently honoured them with his presence, and showed great favour to Heidegger, whom, nevertheless, a grand jury in 1729, after describing the ill con- sequences of these Opera balls, presented, under his name, " as the principal promoter of vice and immorality, in defiance of the laws of this land, to the great scandal of religion, the dis- turbance of his Majesty's Government, and the damage of many of his good subjects." The attempts at a reformation of manners were the less effec- tual, because they were too often mixed up with political parti- zanship, and were not always distinguished by the prudence and judicious moderation which ensure success. The Whig Flying Post, in the August of 1725, contains an attack on the writings of the poet Prior, for their presumed immoral tendency, com- plaining that the names of an archbishop, several bishops, and numerous other dignitaries of the Church, had appeared as sub- scribers to the new edition of bis works on large paper, and adducing, as a remarkable proof of the degeneracy of public manners, that, while Prior's writings were printed elegantly on the finest paper, any sort of print or paper was considered good 70 CUZZONI AND FAUSTINA. enough for the editions of the Holy Scriptures ! This pointed attack upon the poet, then recently dead, is best explained by the circumstance that he had been Harley's agent in the nego- tiations connected with the obnoxious peace of Utrecht, that he had been a prisoner of state at the beginning of King George's reign, and that up to the last he had been looked upon as a dis- affected Tory. There was probably a satirical aim in a para- graph of the London Journal for February n, 1724, which stated, that, " At the last ridotto or ball at the Opera House in the Haymarket, a daughter of his grace the Archbishop of Canterbury won the highest prize."* The operas had flourished equally with the masquerades, and were looked upon with jealousy by those who advocated the dignity of the legitimate English stage. Singers and dancers from Italy, such as Cuzzoni, and Faustina, and Farinelli, ob- tained large sums of money, and returned to build themselves palaces at home, while first-rate actors at Drury Lane or Lin- coln's Inn Fields experienced a difficulty in obtaining respectable audiences. The portraits of the former were engraved hand- somely, and exhibited in every picture-shop. After a serious dispute between Cuzzoni and Faustina for precedence, in the summer of 1727, in which the latter appears to have been the victor, an obscure satirist of the day says, "Cuzzoni can no longer charm, Faustina now does all alarm ; And we must buy her pipe so clear With hundreds twenty-five a year. Either we've money very plenty, Or else our skulls are wondrous empty." The regular theatres were driven, in their own defence, to seek some new method of attracting the patronage which seemed to have been stolen from them by the Italian Opera, and they in- troduced that class of performances, also of foreign growth, which has since become so well known under the title of Pantomime. Gibber, in his autobiographical "Apology," laments the necessity which obliged them to give way to a taste so contrary to the interests of the drama, and his contemporaries in general bear witness that the Drury Lane company opposed the innovation as far as they could. It was Rich, with his Lincoln's Inn com- pany, who first attempted to compete with the Opera by intro- * It appears that gambling of various kinds, as well as lotteries, were permitted at the masquerades. These, with the intrigues of another de- scription, not unfrequently led to quarrels, which ended sometimes in duels, with melancholy results. CARICATURES ON THE STAGE. fi ducing singing and dancing, and English operas and English pantomimes, and what were designated in the play-bills as " grotesque entertainments." In the winter of 1723 this house produced " The Necromancer ; or, Harlequin Dr. Faustus," which had an extraordinary run ; and the next season they brought out a " Harlequin Jack Shepherd." The latter was of course founded upon the exploits of the notorious character, whose history was then fresh in every one's memory, for it was the year of his execution. A rival " Dr. Faustus " was brought out at Drury Lane, and, as it appears, with equal success. This was not the only instance in which the two theatres per- formed at the same time pantomimes under the same title ; in February, 1726, they were both exhibiting a pantomime of Apollo and Daphne, and other similar instances might be pointed out. In these fantastic pieces, wild beasts, and dragons, and other strange personages, made their appearance, such as had never before trodden upon the English stage ; and the writers of the- time tell us, with a scornful smile, that on one occasion a moveable windmill was introduced, and that it produced no small sensation among the astonished spectators. Nor did the innovations stop here, for in the whiter of 1726 mountebanks, and tumblers, and rope-dancers were brought in as a novelty amongst the " grotesque entertainments " of the theatres. The character of the stage, thus smothered under a compli- cated weight of operas, masquerades, pantomimes, and mounte- bank performances, became more and more an object of attack for the press ; and the papers of the opposition took up the subject with the greater zeal, because the evil seemed to be en- couraged by the patronage of the Court. The stage-managers themselves were not uufrequently made the objects of galling personalities, in pamphlets, as well as in the public newspapers. Caricatures exhibited to the eye in exaggerated drawing the shortness of Cuzzoni, the tall awkwardness of Farinelli, and the ugliness of Heidegger.* The manager of masquerades and operas, whom the King had appointed master of the revels, or, as he was termed by foreigners, le surintendant des plaisirs de I'Angleterre, sometimes made a joke of himself as being one of the ugliest men of his age, and it is not therefore to be wondered at if his deficiency in beauty was often a subject of ridicule to the satirist. Fielding, in a satirical poem of his younger days, * The caricature represented on the next page is said to have been designed by the Countess of Burlington, and to have been etched by Goupy ; at least, so we learn from a manuscript note on a copy in the pos- session of Mr. Burke. 7 HEIDEGGER S UGLINESS. "The Masquerade," thus passes a joke on Heidegger's face, which is represented by other writers as having been often mis- taken for a monstrous mask. CTZZONI, FARTNELLT, AND HEIDEGGER. " 'Hold, madam, pray what hideous figure Advances ? ' ' Sir, that's Count H d g r.* ' How could it come into his gizzard, T' invent so horrible a vizzard ?' 'How could it, sir?' says she, ' I'll tell ye : It came into his mother's belly ; For you must know that horrid phiz is (Puria natwalibus) his visage.' ' Monstrous ! that human nature can Have form'd so strange burlesque a man ?' " Heidegger, who was a native of Zurich, in Switzerland, and had come to England as a mere fortune-hunter, was much caressed by the Court and by the nobility, and was now gaining a large income, much of which he expended in charity. He lived profusely, and mixed with the highest society, where his oddness of character and appearance made him sometimes the subject of practical jokes. On one occasion the Duke of Montagu invited him to a tavern, where he was made drunk, and fell asleep. In that situation a mould of his face was taken, from which was made a mask, bearing the closest resemblance to HOGARTH. 13 the original, and the Duke provided a man of the same stature to appear in a similar dress, and thus to personate Heidegger, on the night of the next masquerade, when the King (who was apprised of the plot) was to be present. On his Majesty's entrance, Heidegger, as was usual, bade the music play " God save the King ; " but no sooner was his back turned, than the impostor, assuming his voice and manner, ordered them to play " Charley over the water." On this Heidegger raged, stamped, and swore, and commanded them to re-commence the loyal tune of " God save the King." The instant he retired the impostor returned, and ordered them to resume the seditious air. The musicians thought their master was drunk, but durst not disobey. The house was now thrown into an uproar ; " Shame ! shame ! " resounded from all parts ; and some officers of the guards, who were in attendance upon the King, insisted upon kicking the musicians out, had not the Duke of Cumberland, who, as well as his father, was privy to the plot, restrained them. Heidegger now came forward and offered to discharge his band ; when the impostor advanced, and cried in a plaintive tone, " Sire, the whole fault lies with that devil in my likeness." This was too much; poor Heidegger turned round, grew pale, but could not speak. The Duke of Montagu, seeing it take so serious a turn, ordered the fellow to unmask. Heideg- ger retired in great wrath, seated himself in an arm- chair, furiously commanded his attendants to extinguish the lights, and swore he would never again superin- tend the masquerade, unless the mask was defaced and the mould broken in his pre- sence. A sketch by Hogarth has preserved and immor- talised the face of Heideg- ger on this occasion, when it truly merited the descrip- tion given in one of the sati- rical attacks on the manager of the Opera : " With a hundred deep wrinkles impress'd on thy front, Like a map with a great many rivers upon 't." HEIDEGGEH IN A KAQE. 74 CAEICATURES ON THE STAGE. It was the degeneracy of the stage at this period which brought forward the satirical talents of Hogarth, then a young man. In 1723, immediately after the appearance of the panto- mime of " Dr. Faustus " at Lincoln's Inn Fields, he published his plate of " Masquerades and Operas," with the gate of Bur- lington House in the background, as a lampoon upon the bad taste of the age in every branch of the art. On one side, Satan is represented as dragging a multitude of people through a gateway to the masquerade and opera, while Heidegger is looking down upon them from a window with an air of satisfaction. A large sign-board above has a representation of Cuzzoni on the stage, to whom the Earl of Peterborough is making an offer of eight thou- sand pounds. On the opposite side of the picture, a crowd rushes into the theatre to witness the pantomimes ; and over this gateway appears the sign of Dr. Faustus, with a dragon and a windmill, explained by the lines under the picture, " Long has the stage productive been Of offspring it could brag on ; But never till this age was seen A windmill and a dragon." In the front of the picture a barrow-woman is seen wheeling away, as " waste paper for shops," a load of books, which appear by the inscriptions to be the dramatic works of Shake- speare, Ben Jonson, Dryden, Congreve, and Otway. In 1725 Hogarth published another caricature, entitled " A just View of the British Stage," _ more especially levelled at the BUBBISH. pantomimic performances of the theatres of Drury Lane and Lin- coln's Inn Fields, and suggesting a plan for combining in one piece "Dr. Faustus" and " Jack Shepherd," "with Scaramouch Jack Hall the chimney-sweeper's escape from Newgate through the privy." The three managers of Drury Lane are placed round a table in the centre of the picture. To the left Wilks, dangling the effigy of Punch, exclaims, in exultation at the expected superiority which this expedient is to give them over the rival theatre, "Poor Rich! faith, I pity thee!" Gibber, holding up Harlequin Jack Shepherd, invokes the Muses, who are painted somewhat grotesquely on the ceiling, "Assist, ye sacred nine 1" Booth, at the other end of the table, is letting CIBBEE AND WILKS. 75 the effigy of Hall down the passage by which he is said to have made his exit, and declaring his satisfaction at the new plan by THEATRICAL CONTRIVANCES. a coarse exclamation. The ghost of Ben Jonson rises from a trap-door, and shows his contempt for the new-fangled contri- vances of the stage in a manner that cannot be misunderstood. In 1727 Hogarth published a large "Masquerade Ticket," bitterly satirical on the immoral tendency of masquerades, as well as on their manager, Heidegger. The eagerness with which the public at this period ran after every new sight, and listened to every new opinion, was an object of frequent ridicule to the satirical writers of the day, and this pro- bably made it the age of deistical writers, such as Mandeville and Woolston, Toland, Tindal, and Collins. There were others also, who, without being deists, ventured to broach fantastic notions, which had followers for a time. In the summer of 1726 appeared, what the Political State for that year describes as " a blazing star, that seemed portentous to the Established Church." John Henley, a native of Leicestershire, had gra- duated at Cambridge, but, filled as it would appear with over- weening vanity and assurance, he defied the authority of the Established Church, and not only set up a new religious scheme, which he called Primitive Christianity, but, with a mere smat- tering of knowledge, undertook to teach and lecture upon all sciences, all languages, and, in fact, all subjects whatever, on 76 ORATOR HENLEY. which, to judge from all accounts, he must have talked a great deal of unintelligible rigmarole. On the i4th of May, 1726, Henley first advertised his scheme in the public newspapers, and ou the loth of July, having taken a licence from a magistrate to deliver public lectures, he established what he called his " Oratory," in a sort of wooden booth, built over the shambles in Newport Market, near Leicester Fields, which had formerly been used for a temporary meeting-house by a congregation of French refugees. Here, and in Lincoln's Inn Fields ("the corner near Clare Market"), to which latter place he removed at the end of February, 1729, Henley continued to hold forth for some years, preaching on theological subjects on the Sunday, and on all other subjects on the Wednesday evening, to which sometimes he added a lecture on Monday and Friday. In spite of his locality among the butchers, to whom at times he gave a lecture, which he called his " butchers' oration," the orator exhibited himself in an ostentatious manner, clad in the full robes of a priest, attended by his clerk or reader ; and he em- ployed a man to attend the door, whom he dignified with the name of his " ostiary," and who took a shilling a head for admission. On certain occasions he administered what he termed the "primitive eucharist," and he performed other reli- gious ceremonies. The clergy were highly indignant at this man's proceedings, and he met with opposition from other sources : on the i8th of January, 1729, he was presented by a grand jury for profaning the character of a priest, by delivering indecent discourses in clerical robes, which was probably the cause of his removal to Lincoln's Inn Fields ; but he braved all, until he gradually lost the popularity which for a while filled his Oratory with a numerous audience. This man continued his performances in Clare Market till after the middle of the century. When we look over Henley's weekly advertisements in the newspapers, we cannot but give him credit for singular ingenuity in selecting subjects calculated to excite general curiosity, both in his theological discourses on the Sunday, and in his miscel- laneous lectures on the other days of the week. As he pro- ceeded, he took up exciting political questions, discussed very freely the character of the statesmen and the scholars of the day, made historical parallels, and became abusive, scurrilous, and licentious in his language, invoking the lowest passions rather than the reasoning faculties of his hearers. This course has been attempted in later times, but never with the extra- ordinary success which for a time attended the discourses of AN ORATORY BAPTISM. 77 "orator Henley." In one advertisement it is announced that * The Wednesday's oration will be on Westward Hoe ; or, a frolick on the water, -fire-new :" in another, " The Wednes- day's subject will be ' Over the hills, and far away ; or, Prince Eugene's march.' " On one occasion he states merely that the subject will be " Something alive ;" on another it is " A merry- thought ;" and, among the incredible variety of subjects which composed his long list, it will be quite enough to mention the following, taken at random : " The world toss'd at tennis ; or, a lesson for a king;" "Whether man or woman be the finer creature ;" " A-la-mode de Trance ; or, the art of rising ;" " The wedding lottery ;" " A Platonic chat on Box-hill, de osculis et virginilus ;" " The Cambridge jig ; or, the humours of a com- mencement;" "The Doctors ogling the ladies through their spectacles ;" " A wonder at Windsor ; or, the dream of a dame of honour ;" " Jack at a pinch ; or, Sir Humphrey Haveatall ;" " The triumphs of Tag, Rag, and Bobtail, spick-span new /" The most common subjects were made seductive by some quaint and extraordinary title. We are easily led to doubt the morality of a schemer like Henley, and the reports of his contemporaries seem to rank it AH "OBATORY" BAPTISM. rather low. Hogarth introduced him, according to common report, among the characters in his "Modern Midnight Conver- sation ;" and the same satirical artist represented him in another picture performing the rites of baptism, but evidently more attentive to the beauty of the mother than to the opera- 78 THE "BEGGARS OPERA." tion he is performing on the infant. Another rough sketch by Hogarth represents in burlesque the interior of the Oratory during service. The orator's fame was, however, so great, that several engravings were made of him, representing him holding forth from his pulpit, enriched with velvet and gold. The dispute between Cuzzoni and Faustina, already men- tioned, combined with some other circumstances of disagree- ment, had thrown the Opera management into confusion ; and, in the earlier months of the year 1728, the newspapers contain repeated complaints of the neglect into which the Italian Opera had fallen. It was at this moment that an event occurred, which, for a time, threw both Italian Opera and pantomime into the shade. In February, 1728, appeared at the theatre in Lin- coln's Inn Fields the celebrated "Beggar's Opera," by John Gay, with a tide of success never equalled by any other single piece. This success no doubt arose in a considerable measure from the attractive character of the music, and partly from its peculiar aptness to the moment at which it was published, wLen highway and street robberies had been increasing in an alarming degree, and the characters thus brought on the stage were those on whom people's attention was daily and painfully fixed. The " Beggar's Opera" became, in a few days, the universal talk of the town. Lavinia Fenton, formerly an obscure actress, to whom was given the part of Polly, became an object of general admiration, was celebrated in street-ballads, and her portrait ex- hibited in every shop, and within a short time she became Duchess of Bolton. The airs of the " Beggar's Opera" were adopted as the tunes of political ballads. The piece itself was even performed in a booth at Bartholomew Fair in the autumn following. It was also acted in various parts of England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, an unusual thing for a new piece in those days ; the favourite songs were printed upon fans for the ladies ; houses, as we learn from the notes to the " Dunciad," were furnished with it in screens ; and, as usual, it became the origin of a number of inferior imitations which appeared in different theatres, under the titles of " The Lover's Opera," "The Gypsies' Opera," " The Beggar's Wedding," &c. There were others who cried against the " Beggar's Opera" as loudly as the town cried it up. Many said, with some reason, that its extraordinary success was a proof of a degraded national taste ; others, with much less cause, represented it as an attack upon public morals, and as having a dangerous tendency ; and, as it happened that, during the period which followed its repre- sentation, street robberies in London were unusually frequent, PERSECUTION OF THE "BEGGAR'S OPERA." 79 they hesitated not to ascribe this circumstance to the influence of the " Beggar's Opera." Hogarth caricatured it in a print, representing the actors with the heads of animals, and Apollo and the Muses fast asleep under the stage. In another cari- cature Parnassus was turned into a bear-garden ; Pegasus was drawing a dust-cart, and the Muses were employed in sifting cinders. " Parnassus now like a bear-garden appears, And Apollo there plays on his crowd to the bears : Poor Pegasus draws an old dust-cart along, And the Muses sift cinders, and hum an old song. With a fa, la, &c." ' Among other prints, a medley was published in the style of those on the South Sea scheme, with the title, "The Stage Medley ; representing the polite taste of the town, and the matchless merits of poet G , Polly Peachum, and Captain Macheath." Other prints, of a similar tendency, were distri- buted about the town. At least one clergyman preached against it from the pulpit ; and, even in the latter part of the century, Ireland, Hogarth's editor, repeats traditionary stories, that, after its appearance, young practisers in highway robbery were not unfrequently caught with the " Beggar's Opera" in their pocket. But there was also a political feeling on the subject, for the Lin- coln's Inn theatre had the Tory partialities on its side ; and Gay, slighted by the Whigs, had given dissatisfaction to the Court, and was looked upon as the friend of Pope, Swift, and Bolingbroke. The "Beggar's Opera" itself contained some satirical reflections on the Court ; and the Tory press alone ven- tured to speak in its favour. Mist's Journal of the 2nd of March, 1728, observes, "Certain people, of an envious disposi- tion, attribute the frequency of the late robberies to the success of the ' Beggar's Opera,' and the pleasure the town takes in the character of Captain Macheath ; but others, less concern'd in that affair, and more for the publick, account for them by the general poverty and corruption of the times, and the prevalence of some powerful examples" For these or some other reasons the Court openly discounte- nanced the " Beggar's Opera ;" and, when its author had com- posed for the following season a second part, under the title of " Polly," it was not allowed to be acted. The Duchess of Queensbury, who had advocated Gay's cause with the King and the royal family, was forbidden to appear at Court. But the town took vengeance for their disappointment upon a rival, though, as it would appear, an unoffending writer. Colley 8o POPE AND SWIFT. Gibber had just completed a piece, also in imitation of the " Beggar's Opera," entitled " Love in a Riddle," which he was preparing to bring out at Drury Lane. A report was indus- triously spread abroad that Gibber had obtained the prohibition against Gay's " Polly," in order that he might monopolise the stage to himself ; and, on the day of Gibber's representation, a powerful cabal obtained possession of the theatre, and compelled him to withdraw his performance. Gay published his " Polly" soon after, with some prefatory remarks, in which he protested against the injustice with which it had been treated. By Pope and others Gay was looked upon only as a new instance of the sacrifice of literary genius to party feelings, and the treatment he experienced, perhaps, led in some measure to the appearance of a much more remarkable literary production, which agitated the world of letters for several years. Pope, and his friend Swift, equally bitter in their sentiments, and who both at this period of Whig supremacy lay under a kind of proscrip- tion, had, within a few months, taken an effective revenge by the publication of several violent satires against the degeneracy of their age. In 1727 Swift published the "Travels of Gulli- ver ;" in which he went on ridiculing statesmen, and scholars, and men of the world, and every other class of society, until he ended in one universal libel upon the whole human race. In the same year Pope gave to the world his " Treatise on the Bathos ; or, the Art of sinking in Poetry," under the name of Martinus Scriblerus. These works and their authors were attacked with almost every kind of weapon that the anger of the multitude of inferior writers of the press could supply. Pope especially, whose splenetic and sensitive temper had severed most of his literary friendships, was subjected to every kind of annoyance, and was driven to the highest degree of exasperation, for the judicious but cutting satire of his remarks touched to the quick almost every poetical scribbler of the day. The newspapers were filled with attacks upon his writings, and with jests upon his character, his religion (he had been educated a Roman Catho- lic), his politics (he was the friend of Atterbury and Boling- broke), and even upon his personal deformity. Ambrose Phillips, known chiefly by his Pastorals, is said to have proceeded so far as to hang a rod up in Button's Coffee-house, with which he threatened to chastise the poet of Twickenham the first time he made his appearance there. These attacks were often galling, especially when they came from a class of persons for whom the poet professed extreme contempt ; and it was under the irrita- tion they caused that Pope formed the plan of one general THE " DUNCIAD." 81 satire, in which he might give vent to all his resentments, just or unjust ; and which soon afterwards gave birth to the " Dun- ciad," perhaps the most perfect and finished of his writings. The wholesale nature of the attack is only justified by our knowledge of the degraded state of our national literature at the time he wrote. In this remarkable poem, which was dedicated to Swift, Pope celebrates the wide-extending empire of Dulness, and describes the goddess as holding her court in the neighbourhood of Moor- fields, which then rivalled in celebrity the literary precincts of Grub Street. " Where wave the tatter'd ensigns of Rag-fair, A yawning ruin hangs and nods in air ; Keen, hollow winds howl thro" the bleak recess, Emblem of music caused by emptiness. Here, in one bed, two shiv'ring sisters lie, The cave of Poverty and Poetry. This the great Mother, dearer held than all The clubs of Quidnuncs, or her own Guildhall. Here stood her opium, here she nursed her owls, And destin'd here the imperial seat of fools. Hence springs each weekly muse, the living boast Of Curll's chaste press, and Lintot's rubric post: Hence hymning Tyburn's elegiac lay ; Hence the soft sing-song on Cecilia's day, Sepulchral lies, our holy walls to grace, And new- year odes, and all the Grub-street race. 'Twas here in clouded majesty she shone ; Four guardian virtues, round, support her throne ; Fierce champion Fortitude, that knows no fears Of hisses, blows, or want, or loss of ears ; Calm Temperance, whose blessings those partake Who hunger and who thirst for scribbling sake ; Prudence, whose glass presents th' approaching jail ; Poetic Justice, with her lifted scale, Where, in nice balance, truth with gold she weighs, And solid pudding against empty praise." The scene is laid at the moment when the poet Settle, the King of Dulness, was dying, and the goddess is introduced de- liberating on the choice of a successor. Lewis Theobald, or, as he was popularly called, Tibbald, was then an active writer for the stage, but is now chiefly known by his edition of Shakespeare. Pope, also, had been induced, for what was then a handsome remuneration, to place his name to an edition of Shakespeare ; and Theobald, who was far better versed in the literary antiquities necessary to explain and illus- trate the text of the great dramatist, pointed out the defects of Pope's edition and the errors of his notes in a number of arti- o 8a LEWIS THEOBALD. cles in the weekly papers. Nettled beyond measure at these attacks, for the notes to Shakespeare were a sore place in the poet's reputation, Pope determined to make Theobald the hero of his poem, and him the goddess chooses as the successor to the throne of Dulness, after casting her eyes in vain on Eusden (who then held the place of poet-laureat), " slow " Phillips, and " mad " Dennis. " In each she marks her image full express'd, But chief in Tibbald's monster-breeding breast, Sees gods with demons in strange league engage, And earth, and heav'n, and hell her battles wage. She eyed the bard, where supperless he sate, And pined, unconscious of his rising fate : Studious he sate, with all his books around, Sinking from thought to thought, a vast profound ! Plunged for his sense but found no bottom there ; Then writ, and flounder'd on in mere despair. He roll'd his eyes, that witness'd huge dismay, Where yet unpawn'd much learned lumber lay; Volumes, whose size the space exactly fill'd, Or which fond authors were so good to gild, Or where, by sculpture made for ever known, The page admires new beauties, not its own." The description of Theobald's library, and of his sacrifice to Dulness, is an unjust satire on the class of reading which had enabled him to detect the errors of Pope's Shakespearian criticism. The goddess suddenly reveals herself to the fortunate aspirant, transports him to her temple, and initiates him into her mysteries. She finally announces the death of Settle, and anoints and proclaims him her successor. "Know, Settle, cloy'd with custard and with praise, Is gather' d to the dull of ancient days, Safe where no critics damn, no duns molest." The second book opens with The- obald's enthronement, in a position even more lofty than that occcupied by the orator of Newport Market in his pulpit, or by the bookseller Curll, when he was condemned to the pil- lory for his licentious publications. " HKNLKY'S GILT-TUB." CUBLL AND LINTOT. 83 Among a number of prints and caricatures relating to Henley' one in the collection of Mr. Hawkins represents him as a fox seated upon his tub, with the words " The Orator " beneath. A monkey peeps from within, with neck-bands (acting as clerk), and pointing to money in his hand, the object of the orator's worship : beneath him is written the word " Amen." Behind the orator is a curtain, on which Henley is pictured addressing a large audience, with the inscription INYENTAM ATTT FACIAM, the vain-glorious motto which he placed on medals struck for distribution among his followers. " High on a gorgeous seat, that far outshone Henley's gilt tub, or Fleckno's Irish throne, Or that where on her Curlls the public pours All- bounteous, fragrant grains, and golden show'rs, Great Tibbald nods. The proud Parnassian sneer, The conscious simper, and the jealous leer, Mix in his look. All eyes direct their rays On him, and crowds grow foolish as they gaze. Not with more glee, by hands pontific crownM, With scarlet hats, wide waving, circled round, Rome in her capitol saw Querno sit, Throned on seven hills, the Antichrist of wit." This division of the poem is entirely occupied with a descrip- tion of the games celebrated by the goddess in honour of " Tib- bald's " elevation to the throne. The first prizes are contended for by the booksellers, against whom Pope had proclaimed his hostility in the preface to his and Swift's " Miscellanies," printed in 1727. Curll had provoked him by the surreptitious publication of some of his letters ; but what was Lintot's offence, who had been the publisher of his Homer, is not so clear. These games are described in a style of disgusting coarseness, too characteristic of the satirical writings and cari- catures of the period, and which makes it difficult to reproduce them entire at the present day. When the various prizes of the booksellers have been disposed of, others are proposed to be con- tended for by the poets, in tickling, vociferating, and diving : " The first holds forth the arts and practices of dedicators, the second of disputants and fustian poets, the third of profound, dark and dirty authors." The operation of diving takes place in the muddy waters of the Fleet Ditch, where it emptied itself into the Thames. The last exercise is reserved for the critics, who are to listen without sleeping to the dull nonsensical prose of the orator Henley, and to the everlasting rhymes of Black- more. " Her critics there she summons, and proclaims A gentler exercise to close the games. O 2 84 THE CRITICS. 1 Here, you 1 in whose grave heads or equal scales I weigh what author's heaviness prevails, Which most conduce to soothe the soul in slumbers, My Henley's periods, or my Blackmore's numbers, Attend the trial we propose to make : If there be man who o'er such works can wake, Sleep's all-subduing charms who dares defy, And boast Ulysses" ear with Argus' eye To him we grant our amplest powers to sit Judge of all present, past, and future wit, To cavil, censure, dictate, right or wrong, Full and eternal privilege of tongue." This trial is too much for the critics, and the whole assembly is soon buried in profound slumber, in the midst of which the goddess transports the new king to her temple, whence he is carried in a vision to the Elysian shades, and there meets the ghost of his predecessor Settle, who takes him to the summit of a mountain, whence he is shown the past history, the present state, and the future prospects of the empire of Dulness. In the present he beholds the different worshippers of Dulness in her various walks : on the stage in Gibber ; in the doggrel minstrelsy of Ward ; " From the strong fate of drams, if thou get free, Another Durfey, Ward, shall sing in thee. Thee shall each ale-house, thee each gill-house mourn, And answering gin-shops sourer sighs return ;" in the more presuming writings of Haywood and Centlivre, of Ralph, Welsted, Dennis, and Gildon ; in the party politics of Thomas Burnet, who wrote in a weekly paper called Pasquin, and was rewarded for his zeal with a consulship, and Ducket, who wrote the " Grumbler," and also received an appointment under Government ; "Behold yon pair, in strict embraces join'd : How like in manners, and how like in mind ! Famed for good-nature, Burnet, and for truth ; Ducket for pious passion to the youth. Equal in wit, and equally polite, Shall this a ' Pasquin,' that a ' Grumbler ' write. Like are their merits, like rewards they share, That shines a consul, this commissioner ;" in the peculiar style of antiquarianism of Thomas Hearne ; and in the divinity of Henley, who, the phenomenon of his day, as an apt type of its intellectual character, is again brought for- ward in the full amplitude of his pretensions : " But where each science lifts its modern type, History her pot, Divinity his pipe, VAGARIES OF THE STAGE. 85 While proud Philosophy repines to show (Dishonest sight !) his breeches rent below, Imbrown'd with native bronze, lo ! Henley stands, Tuning his voice, and balancing his hands. How fluent nonsense trickles from his tongue ! How sweet the periods, neither said nor sung 1 Still break the benches, Henley, with thy strain, While Kennet, Hare, and Gibson preach in vain. O great restorer of the good old stage, Preacher, at once, and zany of thy age ! O worthy thou of Egypt's wise abodes, A decent priest where monkeys were the gods ! But fate with butchers placed thy priestly stall, Meek modern faith to murder, hack, and maul ; And bade thee live, to crown Britannia's praise, In Toland's, Tindal's, and in Woolstan's days." From these spectacles the eye of the visionist is suddenly turned to the modern vagaries of the stage, on which dragons and other monsters were brought as actors, and heaven and hell were made the scenery : " He look'd and saw a sable sorcerer rise, Swift to whose hand a winged volume flies ; All sudden, Gorgons hiss and dragons glare, And ten-horned fiends and giants rush'd to war. Hell rises, heaven descends, and dance on earth Gods, imps, and monsters, music, rage, and mirth ; A fire, a jig, a battle, and a ball, Till one wide conflagration swallows all." Greater wonders than these were now crowded into the theatres ; and, to complete the absurdity, in one of the pan- tomimes Harlequin was hatched upon the stage out of a large egg: " Thence a new world, to nature's laws unknown, Breaks out refulgent, with a heav'n its own ; Another Cynthia her new journey runs, And other planets circle other suns : The foreste dance, the rivers upwards rise, Whales sport in woods, and dolphins in the skies ; And, last, to give the whole creation grace, Lo ! one vast egg produces human race ! " These were the creations of Bich, in his empire in Lincoln's Inn Fields : " A matchless youth ! his nod these worlds controls, Wings the red lightning, and the thunder rolls : Angel of Dulness, sent to scatter round Her magic charms o'er all unclassic ground. Yon stars, yon suns, he rears at pleasure higher, Illumes their light, and sets their flames on fire. 86 PANTOMIMES AND OPERAS. Immortal Rich ! how calm he sits at ease Mid snows of paper and fierce hail of peas ; And proud his mistress' orders to perform, Bides in the whirlwind, and directs the storm." He, too, has his rivals : " But lo ! to dark encounter in mid-air New wizards rise : here Booth, and Gibber there. Booth in his cloudy tabernacle shrined, On grinning dragons Cibber mounts the wind : Dire is the conflict, dismal is the din, Here shouts all Drury, there all Lincoln's Inn." These are pronounced to be the advanced guards of the host of Dulness, who is proceeding surely, "Till raised from booths to theatre, to court Her seat imperial Dulness shall transport : Already Opera prepares the way, The sure forerunner of her gentle sway." The natural consequence of this general invasion of barbarism in public taste is, that talent is allowed to starve in the obscurity of neglect. " While Wren with sorrow to the grave descends ; Gay dies unpension'd with a hundred friends ; Hibernian politics, O Swift, thy fate ; And Pope's whole years to comment and translate." Upon the character of the stage Pope's verses had no more effect than Hogarth's prints ; for masquerades continued to be THE CHARMERS OF THE AGE, IN SEDITIOUS PLAYS. 87 the favourite amusements of the town till late in the century, and pantomimes and operas have never altogether lost their popularity. The letters of Horace Walpole bear frequent testi- mony to the attention which the opera excited in fashionable society : yet satirists of every class continued to attack it, and among others Hogarth, who, in 1742, showed his inimitable skill, in giving the character of grotesque coarseness to what so large a portion of his contemporaries looked upon as attractive elegance, in a caricature entitled "The Charmers of the Age," representing the dancing attitudes of two popular artistes of the day, Monsieur Desnoyer and the Signora Barberina, who per- formed at Drury Lane. Underneath the plate Hogarth has added an observation, of which we hardly perceive the whole bearing : " The dotted lines show the rising heights." At the same time the stage became every day, until 1737, more and more a political agent. The pantomimes, by a harm- less tendency to satirise the follies of the day, which they have preserved to the present time, had perhaps some influence in producing this state of things. In October, 1728, a farce called " The Craftsman ; or, the Weekly Journalist," alluding to the scurrilous paper, so celebrated for its attacks on the ministry of Sir Robert Walpole, was performed at the theatre in the Hay- market, " with several entertainments of singing and dancing." Farces, similar in character, appeared frequently during the following years. In 1733 Rich and his company left Lincoln's Inn Fields to take possession of the new and handsome theatre which had been built for them in Covent Garden ; on which occasion Ho- garth published a print, representing Rich's triumphal entry into the new house, with a long train of actors, authors, scenery, &c. Rich, clad in the skin of a dog, one of the personages in the harlequinade of " Perseus and Andromeda," is seated with his mistress in a chariot drawn by satyrs, with Harlequin for his driver. Before them, Gay is carried into the new theatre on the shoulders of a porter. The diminutive figure of Pope is seen in one corner, treating the " Beggar's Opera " in the most contemptuous manner ; from which we are probably justified in supposing that the poet, jealous (as was usual with him) of the extraordinary success of his old friend, had expressed an un- favourable opinion of his production. The year 1737 was one more eventful in the history of the stage. In the preceding year, Fielding (who had begun writing for the stage in 1727 as a young man) brought out at the Hay- market Theatre a farce styled " Pa?quin," which was a direct 88 RECEPTION OF THE " DUNCIAD." lampoon on the Government, and gave no little offence. It may be observed that this was " the new theatre in the Haymarket," which has been already mentioned as occupied, under George I., by a company of French actors. Other such pieces attacked different passing follies in a remarkable style. One, brought on the stage in the beginning of 1737, under the title of "The Worm-doctor, with Harleqin female Bonesetter," threw ridicule upon two remarkable quacks, Dr, Taylor and Mrs. Mapp, who were then practising upon the credulity of the public. Towards May, several farces were acted at the Haymarket, which were open pasquinades on the ministry, and which were universally spoken of as such. The most remarkable of these was a drama- tical satire, in three acts, entitled the " Historical Register for the year 1736," by Fielding, which had a great run during the month of April. Some say that Walpole was alarmed by the effects of this piece ; but, according to Smollett, the manager of a play-house communicated to the minister a still more objec- tionable farce in manuscript, entitled " The Golden Rump," which was filled with treason and abuse upon the Government, and had been offered for exhibition on the stage. Which of these might be the real provocation is of little importance ; Walpole brought the matter before the House of Commons, aud descanted on the impudent sedition and immorality which had been of late propagated in theatrical pieces. The result was the passing of the Act " for restraining the licentiousness of the stage ;" by which it was ordered that no new play should in future be brought on the stage without an express license, a bill which has remained in force to the present time, and under which was established the office of Licencer of Plays. A great but ineffectual clamour was raised against this bill, both within doors and without, particularly by the Craftsman and other opposition papers, who represented it as a violent attempt upon the liberty of the press. Pope's satire upon the literature of his time was more effec- tual than that upon the stage ; because, though the "Dunciad" was palpably a mere receptacle for all the poet's personal re- sentments (which were not always just in themselves), it con- tained more of absolute truth, and was therefore more generally felt. English literature soon afterwards began to rise from the low state to which it had fallen under George I. The " Dun- ciad" is stated to have been written in 1726; surreptitious editions, perhaps with the author's connivance, appeared at Dublin (and were reprinted almost immediately in London) during 1727 ; but it was not publicly owned by Pope till the ATTACKS ON POPE. 89 next year, when he gave to the world an authorized and com- plete edition, with the notes, which conveyed more venom than the poem itself. The uproar among men of letters which this satire caused was almost beyond anything we can conceive. The attack was so general, that almost everybody was up in arms, and the newspapers brought, with provoking regularity, their weekly load of banter and insult. At first, Pope is said to have enjoyed the annoyance he had given to his enemies ; but, in a short time, his sensitive feelings gained the mastery, and, as the attacks upon him became more galling, he experienced more and more the inconveniences usually attendant upon a satirical disposition. The poet must have been suffering under an extraordinary attack of sensitiveness, when he condescended to answer a pretended account of his being horsewhipped as he was walking in Ham Walks, near Twickenham, by an advertisement like the follow- ing, which appeared in the Daily Post of June 14, 1728: " Whereas there has been a scandalous paper cried about the streets, under the title of ' A Popp upon Pope,' insinuating that I was whipped in Ham Walks on Thursday last, this is to give notice that I did not stir out of my house at Twickenham all that day ; and the same is a malicious and ill-grounded report. A. POPE." Among the most determined of Pope's assailants at this time was the bookseller Curll, who was grossly attacked in the " Dunciad," and who had been the victim of the poet's practical resentment on a former occasion. From his shop issued, within two or three months, the " Popiad," the "Curliad," the "Female Dunciad," and several others, in which the private character of the poet was attacked as freely as his public doings. Pope's personal appearance, which was not prepossessing, was also made the subject of satire ; and a quarto pamphlet, entitled " Pope Alexander's Supremacy and In- fallibility examined," is prefaced by an engraving in which his port rait is placed on the sli oulders 9C ATTACKS ON POPE. of a monkey the personality of Poet Pug, which was some- times given to him. A poem called the "Martiniad," in allu- sion to the assumed title of Martinus Scriblerus, under which Pope had ushered the " Treatise on Sinking in Poetry " into the world, gives the following description of his person : "At Twickenham, chronicles remark, There dwelt a little parish clerk, A peevish wight, full fond of fame, And Martin Scribbler was his name ; Meager and wan, and steeple-crown'd, His visage long and shoulders round. His crippled corpse two spindle pegs Support, instead of human legs ; His shrivell'd skin, of dusky grain, A cricket's voice, and monkey's brain." We may give the following from Bricks Weekly Journal of May 2, 1729, as an example of the epigrammatic squibs with which Pope was constantly assailed in the newspapers. " A Receipt againtt Popc-ish Poetry. " Select a wreath of wither'd bays, And place it on the brow of P ; Then, as reward for stolen lays, His neck encircle with a rope. When this is done, his look will show it, Which he's most like, a thief or poet." Pope seems, indeed, to have found few partisans, either among the writers or among the artists of his time. Hogarth THE CLC JI6T DACUEH. POPE BESPATTERING. 91 has introduced him into several of his compositions. In his caricature of " The Man of Taste," published in 1732, Pope is introduced in all his diminutive deformity, in the character of a plasterer, bedaubing the gate of Burlington House with white- wash, while he is throwing, by his awkwardness, a shower of dirt on a coach below, which is understood to have been that of the Duke of Chandos. With his foot he is overturning a pail, and throwing a part of its contents on a man walking beneath, who is designated in the picture by the letter B, which is ex- plained at the foot of the engraving as " anybody that comes in his way ;" while the hero of the piece is described as " A. P pe, a Plasterer, whitewashing and bespattering." The poet had indeed obtained the character of a bespatterer of everybody he met. A little before the appearance of Hogarth's caricature, he had, in his "Epistle on Taste," addressed to the Earl of Burlington, lauded that nobleman's taste in architecture and the other arts at the expense of that of his old patron, the Duke of Chandos, who had recently built himself a magnificent seat at Canons. The satirist was tormented by the number, rather than by the strength, of his assailants, very few of whom were for their talent worthy of his notice, and those who did possess talent were in general the least deserving of his attacks. In 1730, when the uproar occasioned by the " Dunciad " was at its height, a ballad, entitled " The Beau Monde, or the Pleasures of St. James's," informs us, "There's Pope has made the witlings mad, \Vho labour all they can To pull his reputation down, And maul the little man. But wit and he so close are link'd, In vain is all their pother ; They never can demolish one, Without destroying t'other." In Hogarth's engraving of " The Distressed Poet," a picture at- tached to the wall of the Poet's room, in the first edition of the print, represents Pope triumphing over Curll. The contest between a poet of the rank of Pope, and a bookseller of the characterof Curll, carried on in the way in which their quarrel had been conducted, had little of dignity ; and Pope has POPE AND ct-nr.t. pa NEW BOOK OF THE " DUNCIAD." been often blamed for giving undue importance to his victims, by the mode in which he treated them. But he was perhaps more to be blamed for allowing himself, after the lapse of some years, to republish the "Dunciad" in an altered form, for the purpose, as it would seem, of making an unjust, and not very provoked, attack on a man like Colley Gibber. Gibber's " Non- Juror " had never been forgotten by either of the political parties whom it concerned ; he had been rewarded by the Court in 1730 with the place of poet-laureate, and incurred, on the other hand, during his life, the hatred of the Jacobites and the ill-will of the Tories. He is said to have offended Pope by passing a joke on the stage upon the ill-success of a dramatic piece by the poet, who never forgave him. In 1742 appeared a fourth book of the "Dunciad," which was already complete in three, and this fourth book contained a new attack upon Gibber, who had been lampooned in the former part of the " Dunciad," and in other satirical writings by the same author. Gibber now at last winced, and published a violent pamphlet against Pope, who was so incensed that he immediately revised the whole " Dunciad," printed it anew, and substituted as its hero Gibber, in the place of his old enemy " Tibbald." Pope appears now to have made an entirely new set of anta- gonists, and in the fourth book of the " Dunciad," the goddess of Dulness extends her empire over scholars, philosophers, and statesmen. The satirist lampoons, with a mixture of justice and injustice, the course of university education ; the corrupting system (then so generally prevalent) of sending youths of family and rank to complete their education abroad, by making themselves proficient in all the vices and follies of continental society ; and the pursuits at home of the naturalist, the philo- sopher, and the mathematician. The individual instances are again selected according to the poet's personal resentments, and it is enough to say, that among objects of attack with whom we feel less sympathy, we meet with the names of Bentley, Mead, Clarke, and Wollaston. The only object of attack in the first " Dunciad," which reappears here, is the Opera, to which Pope's hostility remained unabated. The goddess, in the new book, holds a sort of levee, at which all classes of her worship- pers attend. The legitimate theatre is present by means of force only, for Pope was one of those who believed that the licensing act was a death blow to the stage. "But held in ten-fold bonds the Muses lie, Watch'd both by Envy's and by Flatt'ry's eye : TSE OPERA. 93 There to her heart sad Tragedy address'd The dagger wont to pierce the tyrant's breast ; But sober History restrain'd her rage, And promised vengeance on a barb'rous age. There sunk Thalia, nerveless, cold, and dead, Had not her sister Satire held her head." While the new occupant of the stage enters partly as a willing attendant, supported by that class of society who had learnt to f admire her by an early acquaintance in foreign climes : " When, lo ! a harlot form soft gliding by, With mincing step, small voice, and languid eye ; Foreign her air, her robe's discordant pride In patchwork flutt'ring, and her head aside: By singing peers upheld on either hand, She tripp'd and laugh' d, too pretty much to stand ; Cast on the prostrate Nine a scornful look, And thus in quaint recitative spoke." 94 CHAPTER IV. GEORGE II. Sir Robert Walpole's Administration Pulteney, Bolingbroke, and the "Patriots" Accession of George II. The Congress of Soissons Prosecution of the Craftsman Tiie Excise Increasing Attacks upon Walpole Violence in the Elections The Gin Act The Prince of Wales Leads the Opposition Foreign Policy : Walpolo and Cardinal Fleury Renewed Attacks upon Walpole, and Diminution of the Ministerial Majorities The "Motion," and its Consequences The Queen of Hungary Walpole in the Minority, and Consequent Resig- nation The Committee of Inquiry. fTHHE misfortunes of the South Sea scheme had, as we have JL already seen, placed Walpole at the head of the ministry, upon which the Whigs, who had been divided since his retire- ment from office in 1717, became again united into one body, with an overwhelming ministerial majority in Parliament, and the hopes of the Tory and Jacobite opposition seemed to be reduced to the lowest ebb. Under Walpole's rule, with com- parative tranquillity at home and peace abroad, the country was increasing rapidly in commercial prosperity, and consequently in riches and strength. It can hardly be doubted by anybody, that, to the firm and able government of Sir Robert Walpole, more than to any other cause, the house of Brunswick owed its permanent establishment in this country, while his pacific policy counteracted the evils that might otherwise have arisen from King George's continental partialities, which had been too much encouraged by the previous ministry. Yet it was Wal- pole's foreign policy, and his alleged subservience to France, which the opposition attacked with the greatest pertinacity, until they drove the veteran from his post, after he had held the reins of government during twenty-two years. The bitterest and most galling attacks to which Walpole was subsequently exposed arose from a new division among the Whigs, the effects of personal pique and disappointed ambition. William Pulteney, the friend and constant adherent of Walpole for many years, and one of the most effective speakers in the House of Commons, disappointed because his promotion, as he thought, was not so rapid as his services merited, quarrelled with his old colleague in 1724, resigned his office of cofferer to PULTENEY AND BOLINGBROKE. 95 the household, and placed himself at the head of a violent party of discontented Whigs, who now took the title of " the Patriots." In the meantime Walpole had been induced to act with leniency towards the exiled Lord Bolinghroke, who had deceived, betrayed, and quarrelled with the Pretender and the Jacobites, but had become enriched, as was said, by a French marriage and by speculations in the Mississippi scheme, and was now residing near Paris. A bill was passed in 1724, restoring him to his forfeited estates, though he was not allowed to recover his seat iu the House of Lords, in spite of the intrigues of the King's mistress, the Duchess of Kendal, whose interest he had secured by liberal bribes. Bolingbroke thus returned to England more enraged on account of what had been withheld from him, than grateful for what he had obtained, and he immediately made common cause with the Tory opposition, and year, after year his talents and his skill in intriguing furnished the sharpest weapons, and contrived the most dangerous plots, against the administra- tion. Pulteney, with, the ultra- Whigs, or "Patriots," joined the Tory opposition, whose leader in the House of Commons had hitherto been that staunch old Jacobite, Sir William Wyndham, who, in his personal resentment againt Walpole, formed a close alliance with Bolingbroke. By their means the country was again filled with seditious attacks upon the Government, in every variety of shape, and the mob was agaia raised into im- portance. In the December of 1726, Bolingbroke and Pul- teney started a political paper under the title of the Craftsman, which was at first issued daily in single leaves, but in 1727 it was changed into a weekly newspaper, published under the title of the Country Journal, or Craftsman, and seems in that form to have had an extensive circulation. It was edited by Nicholas Amhurst, under the fictitious name of Caleb d' Anvers. Boling- broke was, at the same time, pursuing his intrigues with the King's mistress, and it is impossible to say what might have been the result of her determined endeavours to overthrow Sir Robert Walpole, had not her power expired with the sudden death of George I. in the June of 1727. Bolingbroke's faction was doomed, on this occasion, to under- go a succession of disappointments and consequent mortifications. When the hopes they had derived from the Duchess of Kendal were overthrown, they hastened to pay their court to the mis- tress of the new monarch ; but George II. was governed more by his wife than by his mistress, and Queen Caroline was, to the end of her life, Walpole's firmest friend. They next placed 96 TEE ELECTIONS. their hopes in the elections ; but in the Parliament chosen in 1727 the ministerial majority was greater than ever, and the Tories and Patriots were reduced to vent their harmless rage in new exclamations against bribery and corruption. One of the few caricatures of this period, but of which several copies are preserved, was entitled " Ready Money the prevailing Candi- date ; or, the humours of an election." The scene is laid in a country town, where a crowd of voters are receiving bribes in the most public manner. One allows the price of his vote to be deposited quietly in his coat pocket, while he is distinguish- ing himself by the loudness of his cries of " No bribery !" though he adds, in a diminished tone, " but pockets are free." The voice of the opposition was now raised chiefly against the foreign policy of the ministry, who were accused of involving the country in continental quarrels, and of sacrificing the Eng- lish interest abroad, to gratify the King's partiality for his Hanoverian dominions. With a perfect disregard for truth or honesty, (which appear indeed to have been in no great estima- tion with any party during this corrupt age,) and heedless of anything but personal interests and resentments, when the foreign measures of the Government took a bold and threaten- ing character, the opposition cried out strenuously for peace ; and when the ministers were bent upon securing peace, their opponents were equally clamorous for war. Peace was, how- ever, established and preserved by the moderation and forbear- ance of the English and French courts, the councils of the latter being now ruled by Cardinal Fleury ; and the threatening combinations which had clouded the foreign politics of the latter part of the reign of George I. were to a great measure dissipated in the Congress of Soissons, opened on the loth of June, 1728. Satisfied with the success of his policy abroad, the minister retired in the autumn, as usual, to seek a brief relaxation at his seat of Houghton Hall, in Norfolk, and indulge in his favourite pastime of hunting. But the Craftsman fell furiously on the proceedings at Soissons; and as winter and the consequent meeting of Parliament approached, ballads and papers were hawked about the streets, turning the foreign measures of the Court into ridicule, and holding up the minister to contempt as the dupe of French prejudices and partialities. In November, a squib in prose, with a fictitious imprint, was distributed abroad under the title of " The Norfolk Congress ; or, a full and true account of the hunting, feasting, and merry-making : being sin- gularly delightful, and likewise very instructive for the public." This was followed in December by a ballad version, under the FOREIGN DIET. 97 title of " The Hunter hunted ; or, entertainment upon entertain- ment. A new ballad." The minister and his adherents, ac- cording to this squib, repair to the country for the purpose of a great hunting match : " To Houghton Hall, some few days since, All bonny, blithe, and gay, With menial nobles, like a prince, Sir Blue-String took his way. " A mighty hunting was decreed By this same noble crew ; The fox already doomed to bleed, Already in their view." The fox, we are to suppose, represents the wily court of Spain. Before the guests depart for the chase their host gives them a breakfast, which consists of all kinds of foreign dishes. Their hunting is not very successful, for they only set up a vixen, which they lost, for it was screened by an eagle (Austria), and they return disappointed to their dinner, where, instead of find- ing good English diet, they are again surprised with foreign dishes : " Westphalia bacon, many a slice ; Of English beef a chine : Dutch pickled hemngs, salted nice, And truffles from the Seine. " 'Twas with great cost and charges made, Yet none could eat a bit ; For 't would not easily, they said, On English stomachs sit." At the middle of the table sat the Cardinal. The taste of the host was singular : " The master of the house was seen jPZwrni-pudding to devour, And to regale with stomach keen Ou s 1735' "AN ADVERTISEMENT. "To be sold at a stationer's shop in Covent Garden, a neat and curious collection of well-chosen similes, allusions, metaphors, and allegories, from, the best plays and romances, modern and ancient ; proper to adorn a poem or a panegyric on the glorious patriots designed to succeed the present ministry. The similes 55., the metaphors ten, and the allegories a guinea each. "The author gives notice, that all sublunary metaphors, of a new minister being a rock, a pillar, a bulwark, a strong tower, or a spire-steeple, will be allowed very cheap ; celestial ones must be disposed of something dearer, as they are fetched at a greater expense from another world. The new treasurer (W. W.)* may be a Phoebus, the new secretary (W. S.)f a Mer- cury, the new general (D. of O d) a Mars, for a moidore each ; and a tip-top Neptune, to introduce the Chevalier, at the same price. A right Jupiter, being a capital allusion, and fit only for a prime favourite, will be rated at a duckatoon. Comets and blazing stars are reserved for privy- councillors only ; twelve of which are already bespoke and paid for. Mr. Fog and Mr. A ra' have desired to be each a satellite of Jupiter, at a penny the satellite, which is granted. A vagrant, thin, whiffling meteor, dark, yet easily seen thro', is set aside for E. B li, Esq. ; and another of the same odd qualities, for the author of the ' Persian Letters.' The belt of Saturn, little worse for wearing, will be sold a pennyworth. The North Star is bespoke for a hero in the South, || as soon as he arrives next in Scotland to finish his conquests; and the Great Bear for his first minister and confessor, ^f All the signs in the zodiac, except Scorpio, will be sold in * Sir William Wyndham. t William Shippen, M.P. J Fog's Journal, the successor to Mist's, was the chief organ of the Tories after the Craftsman. The latter was, as has been already stated, edited by Nicholas Amhurst, under the assumed name of Caleb d'Anvers. Pf rbaps Eustace Budgell, Esq., a writer in the Craftsman, who com- mitted suici.ie not long after this date. A series of attacks were made on the English ministry at this period, under the fictitious character of memoirs of Persian affairs. II The Pretender. II Probably Bishop Atterbury. I H4 PREVALENCE OF GIN-DRINKING. one lot ; which, for its biting, stinging, scratching, poisonous quality, is set aside for a Gi-ay'i-Inn barrister. * For his steady, regular, uniform motion, W. P.,t Esq., may, with great propriety, be & fixed star of the first mag- nitude, for five guineas ; and a certain viscouut,J the Syrius ardens of Horace, or the incendiary euflaming light in capite Leonis, at the same price. P.S. The same author has, with great pains and study, prepared a collection of state satires, enriched with the newest and most fashionable topics of defamation, which may serve, with a very little variation, to libel a judge, a bishop, or a prime minister. The maker of these satires, a great observer of decorums, begs leave to acquaint the public, that he thinks, a king, in respect to the dignity of his character, ought never to be abused but in folio, morocco leather, and the leaves gilt ; a queen in quarto, neatly bound; a peer in octavo, letter' d on the back ; and a commoner in 12 mo., stitch'd only. . "N.B. The same satirist has collections of reasons ready by him against the ensuing peace, though he has not yet read the preliminaries, or seen one article of the pacification." While the violence of opposition appeared to be subsiding, a new subject of popular discontent suddenly arose in 1736. The depravity of the lower orders, and the debased state of public morals, had frequently been made a subject of declama- tion, and had been attributed to a variety of causes. Many persons of late had ascribed the worst disorders of the times to the increasing vice of drunkenness ; and, in fact, the drinking of gin and other spirituous liquors appears to have prevailed among the lower classes of society to a degree at once alarming and revolting. A paragraph in the Old Whig of Feb. 26, 1736, informs us, " We hear that a strong-water shop was lately opened in South work, with this inscription on the sign : " 'Drunk for id. Dead drunk for id. Clean straw for nothing.' " The newspapers of the period contain frequent announcements of sudden deaths in the taverns from excessive drinking of gin. Some zealous reformers of public manners formed the project of putting a stop to this bane of society by prohibiting the sale of the article which fed it, or, which was the same thing, laying on it a heavy duty, which would make it too expensive to be pur- chased by the poor, and at the same time prohibiting the sale of * Amhurst, the editor of the Craftsman, was of Gray's Inn. + William Pulteney. j ? Lord Carteret. This inscription was afterwards introduced by Hogarth into his carica- ture of Gin Lane, and was remembered at the time of the repeal of the Gin Act in 1743. See Smollett. THE GIN ACT. 115 it in small quantities. A bill with this object was brought into Parliament by Sir Joseph Jekyl, and although Walpole seems not to have given it his entire approbation, was passed, after an energetic opposition by the Patriots in the House, and by those whose interests it affected out of the House. This bill was to come into operation on the 2pth of September following. It appears to have caused no great excitement at first ; but, as the time approached when the populace was to be deprived of their favourite gin, their discontent began to show itself in a riotous shape, and the opponents of the ministry urged them on in every possible manner. Ballads in lamentation of " Mother Gin" were sung in the streets. As early as the 17th July, the Craftsman announces the publication of a caricature, entitled " The Funeral of Madam Geneva," with the addition, " who died, Sept. 29, 1736." As the date last mentioned approached, the excitement increased, and serious riots were prevented only by the watchfulness of the authorities. The signs of the liquor- shops were everywhere put in mourning ; and some of the dealers made a parade of mock ceremonies for " Madam Geneva's lying in state," which was the occasion of mobs, and the justices were obliged to commit " the chief mourners " to prison. The Daily Gazetteer says, "Last Wednesday (Sept. 29), several people made themselves very merry on the death of Madam Gin, and some of both sexes got soundly drunk at her funeral, for which the mob made a formal procession with torches, but com- mitted no outrages." The same newspaper adds : " The exit of Mother Gin in Bristol has been enough bewailed by the retailers and drinkers of it ; many of the latter, willing to have their fill, and to take the last farewell in a respectful manner of their be- loved dame, have not scrupled to pawn and sell their very clothes, as the last devoir they can pay to her memory. It was observed, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, that several re- tailers' shops were well crowded, some tippling on the spot, while others were carrying it off from a pint to a gallon ; and one of those shops had such a good trade, that it put every cask they had upon the stoop ; and the owner with sorrowful sighs said, ' Is not this a barbarous and cruel thing, that I must not be permitted to fill them again ? ' and pronounced a heavy woe on the instruments of their drooping. Such has been the lamen- tation, that on Wednesday night her funeral obsequies were performed with formality in several parishes, and some of tht votaries appeared in ragged clothes, some without gowns, and others with one stocking ; but among them all, we don't hear of any that have carried their grief so far, as to hang or drown 12 ii6 WORKING OF THE GIN ACT. themselves, rather choosing the drinking part to finish their sorrow ; and accordingly a few old women are pretty near tip- ping off the perch, by sipping too large a draught. We hear from Bath, that Mother Gin has been lamented in that city much after the same manner." Similar scenes were witnessed in other cities and towns. In reading accounts like these, we seem to have before our eyes the pictures of Hogarth. The Gin Act did but little good ; for while, on one hand, it encouraged a troop of common informers, who became the pest of the country, it was on the other hand evaded in every possible manner, and with great facility. Not only was gin publicly sold in shops, but hawkers carried it about the streets in flasks and bottles, under fictitious names. The titles thus adopted were in some cases amusing enough. Read's Weekly Journal of October 23rd tells us, " The following drams are sold at several brandy-shops in High Holborn, St. Giles's, Thieving Lane, Tothill Street, Kosemary Lane, "Whitechapel, Shoreditch, Old Mint, Kent Street, &c. ; viz. Sangree, Tom Roe, Cuckold's Com- fort, Parliament Gin, Make Shift, the Last Shift, the Ladies' Delight, the Baulk, King Theodore or Corsica, Cholick and Gripe Waters, and several others, to evade the late Act of Par- liament." Others coloured the liquor, and exposed it in bottles, labelled " Take two or three spoonfuls of this four or five times a day, or as often as the fit takes you." Some people set up as chemists, selling chiefly " cholick-water " and " gripe-water," with the further intimation that they gave " advice gratis " And when some of the evaders of the law were brought before the courts for examination, and it was observed that the che- mists' shops were much more frequented than formerly, they are represented as giving for answer, " that the late act had given many people the cholic, and that was the reason they had so many patients." The gin agitation continued unabated through the years 1737 and 1/38, and gave rise to many a ballad and broadside. In the July of the former year appeared, among many other similar productions, " The Fall of Bob ; or, The Oracle of Gin : a tra- gedy ;" and " Desolation ; or, The Fall of Gin : a poem." It was not an unusual thing to hear of three or four hundred in- formations against people for the illegal sale of gin at one time. The informers were unprincipled people, who not only used all kinds of snares to decoy their victims, but sometimes laid false informations, to gratify private revenge. They thus became objects of extreme hatred to the mob ; and whenever they fell into the hands of the populace, they were treated in an unmerci- THE PRINCE OF WALES, 117 ful manner, beaten rudely, rolled in the dirt, pumped upon, and often carried to some horse-pond outside the town to be ducked. In some cases this last operation was performed in the Thames ; and there were instances in which the offender was thrown into the river, and narrowly escaped drowning. This exercise of mob-justice had become so frequent in the autumn of 1737, that it was found necessary in September to issue a proclamation, offering a reward of 20 for the discovery of any person con- cerned in such outrages, a measure which had, however, a very limited effect in checking them. In the course of 1737 Walpole lost his best supporter in Queen Caroline, who died on the 2oth of November ; and the opposition had already been strengthened by the accession to their ranks of Frederick Prince of Wales, who had first been led into a violent quarrel with his father, and then took the lead in all measures likely to embarrass his father's government. The Prince had taken up his residence at Norfolk House, where, from this time, all the movements of the opposition were dis- cussed and resolved upon. Encouraged by this great addition to their strength, the allied " Patriots " and Tories roused them- selves for the senatorial strife, and the session of 1738 was perhaps the most stormy one that Walpole had yet passed. The object of attack was the foreign policy ; for the opposition believed, that, if they could only push the country into a war, the present ministry would be obliged to go out of office. The English merchant-vessels had been long in the habit of carry- ing on an illicit commerce on the coast of the Spanish posses- sions in America, to hinder which the Spanish government had lately ordered its guarda-costas to be more watchful in their duties, and the Spanish commanders in carrying out these duties, seem often to have shown an unnecessary degree of insolence and severity. The right of search, which has usually been claimed under such circumstances, was always a tender question ; and the English merchants, on the present occasion, made loud complaints of the injuries they were daily suffering. One Captain Robert Jenkyns pretended, that, when his vessel had been searched, the Spaniards had, in an insolent and cruel manner, cut off one of his ears. It was insinuated by the ministerial supporters, that, if Jenkyns had lost his ear at all, it had been taken from him on the pillory. He was evidently the tool of a party. Nevertheless, this story, which Edmund Burke afterwards called " the fable of Jenkyns' ear," produced an extraordinary sensation, and the captain was brought forward to make a statement of his wrongs before the House of Com- n8 THE CONVENTION WITH SPAIN. mons. Walpole found himself, to a certain degree, obliged to give way to the popular clamour, and make a slight show of \\arlike demonstration. He felt, in fact, that the conduct of the Spaniards could not in all respects be defended ; but he still clung to his pacific policy, and carried on negotiations with the court of Sj ain which led at the end of the year to a convention, stipulating for the release of some prizes and the payment of certain sums of money, but which convention was understood in the light of a preliminary to the arrangement of a subsequent treaty. These negotiations were not what the opposition wanted, and they openly accused the minister of sacrificing the interests of his country, with uo other object than that of keeping his place. In November, we find the Craftsman employing its pleasantry on Walpole's great belly and on his luxurious living, and accus- ing him of suppressing the truth, in order to conceal the real extent of the Spanish depredations. Among the most popular caricatures published at this time, was a series of prints (con- tinued in the year following) under the title of " The European Races," which require, what was really printed, a pamphlet to explain them. Another caricature, entitled " In Place," repre- sents the minister sitting at his official table, and refusing to PABIKQ THE NAILS OP THE BRITISH hear the numerous petitions and complaints, while a man with a caudle is burning one of the numbers of the Craftsman. A THE NEGOTIATORS. 119 print, entitled " Slavery," exhibits the well known story of Jenkyns' ear. Another, published in October, 1738, applies the fable of the lion in love, and represents Sir Robert Walpole keeping the lion of England tame, while the Spaniard cuts his nails. The character of the pamphlets on the same subject may be surmised from the title of one advertised in the month of September, " Ministerial Virtue ; or, Long-suffering extolled in a great man." The negotiations of the minister were sati- rised bitterly in " The Negotiators ; or, Don Diego brought to reason : an excellent new ballad ; " which may be cited as an example of the political ballads made on this occasion. Wai- pole's negotiations, according to this ballad, must silence the clamours of the injured merchants : "Our merchants and tars a strange pother have made, With losses sustuin'd in their ships and their trade ; But now they may laugh and quite banish their fears, Nor mourn for lost liberty, riches, or ears: Since Blue-String the great, To better their fate, Once more has determined he'll negotiate; And swears the proud Don, whom he dares not to fight, Shall submit to his logic, and do 'em all right. "No sooner the knight had declared his intent, But straight to the Irish Don Diego he went ; And lest, if alone, of success he might fail, Took with him his brother to balance the scale. For long he had known, "What all men must own, That two heads were ever deem'd better than one : And sure in Great Britain no two heads there are That can with the knight's and his brother's compare." The Don will not receive them on their first call, but he admits them on the second day, and the knight (Walpole) states their business, and petitions lor the delivery of the ships of the English merchants detained by the Spaniards. Horace recounts the various secret services which his brother has performed for the latter power : " ' Consider how oft himself he exposed, And 'twixt you and Great Britain's just rage interposed : When her fleets were equipp'd, you must certainly know, By him they were hinder" d from striking a blow. Thus Hosier the brave Was sent to his grave, On an errand which better had fitteda slave ; Being order'd to take (if he could) your galleons, By force of persuasion, not that of his guns.' " The Don replies in a tone of astonishment : 120 WAR WITH SPAIN. " Quoth the Don, ' What you say, my good friends, may be true, But I wonder that you for such varlets will sue. Merchants ! ha ! they were once sturdy beggars, I think,* And, were I in your place, I would let them all sink. They opposed your excise ; Then if you are wise, Reject their petitions, be deaf to their cries ; And let us like brothers together agree, You excise them on land, I'll excise them at sea.' " The minister's answer is in perfect accordance with the senti- ments of the Don : " 'Noble Don,' quoth the knight, ' I should heartily close (For hugely I like it) with what you propose. Our merchants are grown very saucy and rich, And 'tis time to prepare a good rod for their breech : Were I once to speak true, Give the Devil his due, I love them as little, nay, far less than yon ; And would willingly crush them, but that I'm afraid Of this a bad use by my foes might be made.' " In the sequel, a private arrangement is made ; the Spaniard takes a bribe, and agrees to appear more moderate ; and the King and the nation are equally deceived by a specious story of the terror inspired by the renown of the British arms. The outcry against the insolence of the Spaniards continued unabated in 1 739, and the " convention," signed at Madrid on the i4th of January, was designated as an "infamous" betrayal of the natural rights of Englishmen, because it did not insist upon claims which really had never been allowed by Spain. When Parliament met, the opposition had increased in violence ; their clamours against the articles and principles of the " con- * During the debates on the Excise scheme in the beginning of 1 733, the House of Commons was beset by a tumultuous mob, who not only solicited the members to vote against the ministerial measure, but even employed threats. Smollett informs us, that one day " Sir Robert Walpole took notice of the multitudes which had beset all the approaches to the House. He said it would be an easy task for a designing seditious person to raise a tumult and disorder among them : that gentlemen might give them what name they should think fit, and affirm they were come as humble suppliants; but he knew whom the law called sturdy beggars, and those who brought them to that place could not be certain but that they might behave in the same manner. This insinuation was resented by Sir John Barnard, [the member for London,] who observed that merchants of character had a right to come down to the Court of Requests and lobby of the House of Commons, in order to solicit their friends and acquaintance against any scheme or project which they might think prejudicial to their commerce : that when he came into the House, he saw none but such as deserved the appellation of sturdy beggars as little as the honourable gentleman himself, or any gentleman whatever." DUTCH FRIENDSHIP. 121 vention " were loud in both Houses, and Jenkyns' " ear " made a greater figure than ever. In this debate William Pitt, then a young man, first distinguished himself in the ranks of the oppo- sition. The minister, however, still carried the day by his majorities ; and a portion of the opposition, led by Sir William Wyndham, had recourse to the dramatic effect of a public se- cession from the House, a measure very acceptable to the Government, and which was far from producing the results expected from it. But the overbearing conduct of Spain soon seconded the efforts of the English " Patriots " in hurrying the two countries into a war, which was declared on the ipth of October, 1739, amid the enthusiastic shouts of the mob. The French court showed anything but a friendly aspect towards England on this occasion ; and, by its threats and persuasions, Holland was induced to remain neutral, and withhold the aux- iliary troops which the States were bound by treaties to furnish to their ally ; so that England was left to fight single-handed, with a small army and not a well-manned fleet, and a Parlia- mentary opposition who cried out against every method of in- creasing the former or raising sailors for the latter, and yet who began soon to blame the Government for their want of vigour in carrying on hostilities. The behaviour of the Dutch was the subject of a caricature, entitled " The States in a Lethargy," in which they are represented by a lion asleep in a cradle, rocked by Cardinal Fleury. DUTCH FRIENDSHIP. The caricatures began now to be more numerous and more spirited than at any previous period. Among those which 192 JACK THE GIANT-KILLER. appeared towards the end of the year, we may mention one, bearing date the 8th of October, 1739, and entitled "Hocus Pocus ; or, The Political Jugglers," which is divided into four compartments. In the first an Englishman is seen fighting with a Spaniard, while "Hogan" (the Dutchman) takes the opportunity of picking his pocket. The second compartment represents Commerce, in the form of a bull, baited by all the powers concerned on this occasion. In the third, Cardinal Fleury appears as a negotiator, with money on a table ; while the fourth represents Gibraltar besieged by the Spaniards. This port had now begun to be looked upon as one of vital importance for English commerce. Another caricature, pub- lished about the end of the year, under the title of " Fee Fau Fum," and like the former divided into four compartments, pictures the minister in the character of Jack the Giant-killer. In the first compartment the political hero has betrayed a mighty giant, the personification of the Sinking Fund, into a pit, and is destroying him with his pick-axe. On the giant's THE POtmCAL JACK THE GIANT-KILLEB. girdle is inscribed the word "Convention," and round his garter " The Ear" of course the celebrated ear of Captain Jenkyns, which, with the subsequent convention, had brought on the war that had obliged the Government to draw heavily upon the Sinking Fund in order to defray its expenses. In the second compartment Jack is encountering the giant Fleury. In the third he is pursuing a two-headed giant, armed with a club (? Spain and France.) In the fourth, the minister, in his character of the hero, is knocking boldly at the castle gate, while a three-headed giant (Spain, France, and Sweden) is CAPTURE OF PORTO SELLO. 123 JACK IN HIS GLOBT. looking upon him from a window above. The English govern- ment had narrowly escaped a war with the latter of these three powers ; France, as we have already seen, acted a part calculated to excite the appre- hensions of the English ; and Spain was engaged in open hostilities, and inflicting on the merchants much greater injuries than they had sus- tained from her guarda-costas. The war with Spain was carried on with no great activity ; and the only event which threw any credit upon it was the taking of Porto Bello, in the Isthmus of Darien, on the 22nd of November, 1 739, by Admiral Vernon, with six ships of the line. It appears that this success was owing more to the cowardice of the garrison, than to the conduct of the English admiral, who was a vain man with no great capacity. But he was a personal enemy of the minister, and he was on that account cried up by the opposition, and became in conse- quence the popular hero of the mob, who were made to believe that the Government was jealous of him because he was a "patriot." When the news reached home in March, 1740, his friends in England fed his discontent, by telling him that Hie Court opposed the public acknowledgment due to his merits ; and he wrote back to his friends that he was checked in his victorious career by the neglect of the ministers at home. It was hinted that the Government would willingly see Vernon's armament perish in inactivity, as they had suffered that of Admiral Hosier to die away on the same station in 1726. This was a means of reviving old clamours and animosities, for the fate of poor Hosier had excited great sympathy. A print was published, entitled, " Hosier's Ghost," and representing the spectres of the unfortunate brave who had thus perished in those unhealthy seas, calling upon Vernon's sailors for revenge ; and a pathetic ballad was distributed, which has retained its popularity even in modern times, from the circum- stance of its insertion in the " Reliques " of Bishop Percy. It was attributed to Pulteney ; but the true writer is understood to have been Glover, the author of " Leonidas." 124 HOSIERS GHOST. ADMIRAL HOSIER'S GHOST. "As near Porto Bello lying On the gently swelling flood, At midnight with streamers flying Our triumphant navy rode ; There while Vernon sate all-glorioua From the Spaniards' late defeat, And his crews with shouts victorious, Drank success to England's fleet, " On a sudden, shrilly sounding, Hideous yells and shrieks were heard ; Then, each heart with fear confounding A sad troop of ghosts appear' d, All in dreary hammocks shrouded, Which for winding-sheets they wore, And with looks by sorrow clouded Frowning on that hostile shore. " On them gleam'd the moon's wan lustre, When the shade of Hosier brave His pale bands was seen to muster Rising from their watery grave. O'er the glimmering wave he hy'd him, Where the Burford* rear'd her sail, With three thousand ghosts beside him, And in groans did Vernon hail. " ' Heed, oh heed, our fatal story, I am Hosier's injured ghost, You who now have purchased glory At this place where I was lost ! Though in Porto Bello's ruin You now triumph free from fears, When you think on our undoing, You will mix your joy with tears. " ' See these mournful spectres sweeping Ghastly o'er this hated wave, Whose wan cheeks are stain 'd with weeping* These were English captains brave 1 Mark those numbers pale and horrid, Those were once my sailors bold ! Lo, each hangs his drooping forehead, While his dismal tale is told. " 'I, by twenty sail attended, Did this Spanish town affright : Nothing then its wealth defended But my orders not to fight. Oh ! that in this rolling ocean I had cast them with disdain, And obey'd my heart's warm motion, To have quell'd the pride of Spain ! * The name of Admiral Vernon's ship. > HOSIER'S GHOST. 125 " ' For resistance I could fear none, But with twenty ships had done What thou, brave and happy Vernon, Hast achiev'd with six alone. Then the bastimentos never Had our foul dishonour seen, Nor the sea the sad receiver Of this gallant train had been. " 'Thus, like thee, proud Spain dismaying, And her galleons leading home, Though, condeinn'd for disobeying, I had met a traitor's doom, To have fallen, my country crying He has play'd an English part, Had been better far than dying Of a grievM and broken heart. " ' Unrepining at thy glory, Thy successful arms we hail ; But remember our sad story, And let Hosier's wrongs prevail. Sent in this foul clime to languish, Think what thousands fell in vain, Wasted with disease and anguish, Not in glorious battle slain. " ' Hence with all my train attending From their oozy tombs below, Thro* the hoary foam ascending, Here I feed my constant woe : Here the bastimentos viewing, We recal our shameful doom, And our plaintive cries renewing, Wander thro' the midnight gloom. " ' O'er these waves for ever mourning Shall we roam deprived of rest, If to Britain's shores returning You neglect my just request. After this proud foe subduing, When your patriot friends you see, Think on vengeance for my ruin, And for England shamed in me !' " For a while nothing was talked of hut Vernon and Porto Bello, and even the French were said to have become alarmed at our rising power in America. A caricature, published in July, 1740, under the title of " The Cardinal in the Dumps, with the Head of the Colossus," represents Fleury looking with amaze- ment on the portrait of Admiral Vernon, and exclaiming, " G d, he'll take all our acquisitions in America ! His iron will get the better of my gold 1" In the background the head of Walpole appears raised on a pole, under which is written, "The PREPARATIONS FOR THE ELECTIONS. preferment of the Bar- ber's Block ;" and still lower, through an aper- ture of the wall, is seen the picture of " Poor Hosier's " [Ghost.] In several prints is- sued during this year Walpole was carica- tured as the Great Co- lossus, as the idol to THE CABDINAL IN THE DUMPS. whom all must bo\V who would obtain Court favour ; and the clamour daily became louder against the posses- sion of too much power by a prime minister. No actions of importance followed the capture of Porto Bello, while the merchants suffered much more seriously from, the Spanish cruisers and privateers than from the petty aggres- sions of their guarda-costas, and they filled the country with their complaints against the mismanagement of the war. This, joined with a great scarcity of provisions in consequence of an unfavourable season, increased so much the general dissatis- faction, that riots of the most serious character took place in different parts of the island, attended in some instances with bloodshed, and the name of Walpole became exceedingly un- popular. The opposition looked forward with confident hopes to the effect of this excitement on the elections, which were to come on in the spring of 1741, and for which they were making active preparations before the end of the year. In November appeared a bitter metrical lampoon on Walpole, entitled, " Are these Things so ? The previous question from an Englishman in his Grotto to a Great Man at Court," pointing out all the political sins ascribed to his administration in very strong language, and taking for its significant motto the words of Horace " Lusisti satis, edisti satis, atque bibisti, Tempus abire tibi." It was immediately followed by another pamphlet in the same strain under the title " Yes, they are ;" and these, with one or two answers and rejoinders, seem to have made a considerable sensation. In the beginning of 1741 all the old subjects of clamour against the Government were revived, and almost every opposition paper was filled with new attacks on the THE MOTION. excise project and on the " in- famous " convention. Lists of the members who voted for and against the latter measure were industriously spread among the electors. Amidst a variety of political squibs, there appeared on the pth of January a caricature entitled "The Devil upon Two Sticks. To the worthy Electors of Great Britain ;" in which two of the members are repre- sented carrying the minister over a slough or pond upon their shoulders, whilst some have got over in safety, though not with- out evident marks of the wet and dirt through which they had passed. Britannia and her "Patriots" remain behind. Un- derneath are written the words "Members who voted for the vention." The expectations of the opposition had now become so san- guine, that they determined not to wait for another session to impress upon the minister the truth of the motto which had been applied to him in the title-page just alluded to. Sandys, one of the most discontented of the discontented Whigs, and who, for the readiness with which he always put himself for- ward on such occasions, had obtained the name of " The Motion Maker," was again chosen to take the lead. On the ijth of February, 1741, at the conclusion of a long and violent attack upon Walpole, reviewing the whole of his foreign policy, stig- matising him as a tool of France, who had sacrificed the real English interests on the Continent to the aggrandisement of the House of Bourbon, and charging him with arrogating to himself the " unconstitutional" place of sole minister, and with unnecessarily burthem'ng his country with debts and taxes, Sandys moved an address to the King, " that he would be gra- ciously pleased to remove the Right Honourable Sir Robert Walpole from his Majesty's presence and councils for ever." This motion was seconded by Lord Limerick and warmly sup- ported by Pulteney, Pitt, and others. As the opposition seemed to approach nearer to the attainment of power, the discordant THE DEVIL UPON TWO STICKS. Excise and against the Con- 128 CARICATURE ON THE MOTION. materials of which it was composed began to show their want of cordiality, and on Sandys' motion the Jacobites and many of the Tories left the house before the division. The consequence of this desertion was, that the minister, who made an able speech in his own defence, triumphed by an unusually large majority. On the same day, Lord Carteret (who had become one of Walpole's most violent opponents, and aspired to his place) produced a similar motion in the House of Lords, and was seconded by the Duke of Argyle, and supported by the Duke of Bedford and other opposition peers ; but the victory of the court party was here as complete as in the other house. The opposition shrunk back confused and mortified ; and Walpole's friends and supporters set no bounds to their exulta- tion. Within a few days appeared a print entitled " The Mo- tion," of which a copy is given in the accompanying plate. It was one of the most spirited, and became one of the most celebrated, caricatures of the day. The background represents Whitehall, the Treasury, and the adjoining buildings, as they then stood. Lord Carteret, in the coach, is driven towards the Treasury by the Duke of Argyle as coachman, with the Earl of Chesterfield as postilion, who, in their haste, are overturning the vehicle ; and Lord Carteret cries " Let me get out ! " The Duke brandishes a wavy sword, instead of a whip ; and between his legs the heartless changeling Bubb Dodington sits in the form of a spaniel. Their characters are thus set forth in the verses printed beneath the original engraving : " Who be dat de box do sit on ? 'Tis John, the hero of North Briton, Who, out of place, does place-men spit on, Doodle, &c. 4 ' Between his legs de spaniel curr see, 'Though now he growl at Bob so fierce, Yet he fawn'd on him once in doggerel verse. Doodle, &c. "And who be dat postilion there, Who drive o'er all, and no man spare ? 'Tis Ph 1 p e le of here and there. Doodle, &c. " But pray who in de coach e sit-a ? 'Tis honest J nny C t ritta, Who want in place again to get-a. Doodle, &c." Lord Cobham holds firmly by the straps behind, as footman; while Lord Lyttelton follows on horseback, characterized equally -" CARICATUBE ON THE MOTION. 12$ by his own lean form, and by that of the animal across which he strides. " Who's dat behind ? 'Tis Dicky Cobby, Who first would have hang'd, and then try'd Bobby. Oh ! was not that a pretty jobb-e ? Doodle, &c. " Wbo's dat who ride astride de poney, So long, so lank, so lean, and bony ? Oh ! he be the great orator, Little- Toney ! Doodle, &c. In front, Pulteney, drawing his partisans by the noses, and wheeling a barrow laden with the writings of the opposition, the Champion, the Craftsman, Common Sense, &c., exclaims, " Zounds ! they are over ! " " Close by stands Billy, of all Bob's foes The wittiest far in verse and prose ; How he lead de puppies by de nose !" To the right, Sandys, dropping in astonishment his favourite Place Bill (which had been so often thrown out of the House), cries out " I thought what would come of putting him on the box!" " Who's he dat lift up both his handes ? Oh ! that's his wisdom, Squire S s ! Oh ! de Place Bill drop ! oh ! de army standes !" The prelate, who bows so obsequiously as they pass, is Small- brook, Bishop of Lichfield. " What parson's he dat bow so civil ? Oh 1 dat's de bishop who split de devil, And made a devil and a half, and half a devil !'' Several editions of " The Motion " were published, and one, in the collection of Mr. Burke, is fitted for a fan. Another, very neatly drawn and etched on a folio plate, and dated February ipth, contains great variations, and wants much of the pointed meaning of the genuine print. They here appear to be driving into a river ; Pulteney and Sandys are omitted ; two prelates hold on by the straps behind the coach, which seems in no imminent danger of falling ; yet Carteret cries out to his driver, u John, if you drive so fast, you'll overset us all, by G d!" Horace Walpole, who received a copy of " The Motion '.' at Florence, writes to his friend Conway, " I have received a print by this post that diverts me extremely ' The Motion.' Tell me, dear, now, who made the design, and who took the likenesses ; they are admirable ; the lines are as good as one sees on such occasions." 130 THE REASON AND MOTIVE. On the and of March the " Patriots " retaliated with a carica- ture entitled " The Eeason," in which we have another carriage, with the portly form of Sir Robert Walpole as coachman : " Who be dat de box do sit on t Dat's de driver of G B , Whom all de Patriots do spit on." The verses, as it will be seen by this specimen, are a parody on those attached to " The Motion," to which it is inferior in point and spirit. On one side of the foppish and effeminate Lord Hervey, so well known by Pope's satirical title of " Lord Fanny," who had distinguished himself on the ministerial side in the debate in the House of Lords, is represented as riding on a wooden horse, drawn by two individuals, one of whom says, encouragingly, " Sit fast, Fanny, we are sure to win." The verses referring to this figure, are LOBD RANNT. *' Dat painted butterfly so prim-a, On wooden Pegasus so trim-a, Is something nothing 'tis a whim-a." Lord Hervey was in the habit of painting his face to conceal the ghastly paleness of his countenance. Another copy of this caricature, with some variations, was published so quickly after the original, that, in the advertisement of the latter in the London Daily Post of March 3rd (the day after the date en- graved on the plate), the public are desired to beware of a " piratical print " under the same title. Another rather elaborate caricature was published about the same time under the title of " The Motive ; or, Keason for his Honour's Triumph ;" directed, like the last, against the minis- try, and with similar verses at the foot. Walpole, in the same character of coachman, drives the carriage inscribed as the " Commonwealth," with the King within it, and, with the Duke of Marlborough as his second, goads on Merchandize, the Sink- ing-fund, and Husbandry as his horses. A number of different groups bear allusion to the various methods by which the bribery and corruption with which Walpole was charged influenced his supporters. THE GROUNDS. 131 On March the 6th was advertised a caricature entitled " A Consequence of the Motion." The Daily Post announces the publication, on Saturday the 7th of March, of another carica- ture against the opposition, under the title of " The Political Libertines ; or, Motion upon Motion." In this print the coach is again broken down in front of the Exchequer, and most of the characters are reproduced who had figured in the former print of " The Motion," in very similar positions. Lord Lyttel- ton is as before riding on " poor Rosinante ;" Chesterfield is again postilion ; Pulteney disapproves of the driver ; and Sandys, with the Pension Bill hanging from his pocket, shrugs his shoulders and exclaims, " Z ns ! it's all over ! " "Grave Sam [Samuel Sandys] was set to put the motion, For his honour's high promotion, But the House disliked the notion." Bishop Smallbrook also makes his appearance again, accom- panied by a hog, which grunts fiends from its mouth ; while the churchman says, " I can pray, but not fast ! " " Next the prelate comes in fashion, Who of swine has robb'd the nation, Though against all approbation. " There are in- the same print many other allusions to the minor subjects of political agitation of the day. An advertisement in the same number of the Daily Post (the yth of March) states that " on Monday next will be published (to supply the defects of ' The Keason' and The Motive') ' The Grounds ;' a print setting forth the true reasons of the motion, in opposition to a print called ' The Motion.' " In the same paper of the loth of March, " The Grounds" is advertised for sale. This caricature, which is rather gross, was intended to expose the various ways in which the minister extorted money from the country, and ex- pended it in bolstering up his own power in office. He is repre- sented, under the title of Volpone the Projector, cutting up an infant, intended to represent the Sinking Fund, on a machine which is called the money-press. It is drawn by a pack of his supporters, yoked and harnessed ; and, in its way, manufactures, trade, honesty, and liberty are crushed under the wheels. Be- hind it, the Gazetteer and Freeman's Journal, with others of the minister's paid organs of the press, are beating for recruits. In the foreground " Bribery and Corruption," personified by a fair and gaily dressed lady, is distributing bishoprics and law appoint- ments to orelates and judges, who likewise have yokes round their necks ; one of the former exclaims " Thy yoke is easy, and thy 132 THE FUNERAL OF FACTION. burden light;" while a judge says, with equal eagerness, " Tour will to us shall be a law !" Behind the prelates are a crowd of yoked excisemen, longing for a general excise ; and on the other side the officers of the army standing in a similar predicament. In the distance are Torbay with the English fleet, and the har- bours of Brest and Ferrol with the fleet of France : Walpole is emitting two winds, one of which hinders the English fleet from leaving its station in Torbay, while the other blows the French fleet on its way to the West Indies. Contrary winds had delayed Admiral Ogle's departure from Torbay to reinforce Vernon at this critical moment, which the opposition unjustly attributed to Walpole's mismanagement. " De Register Bill he take lately in hand, Dat de forces by sea, as well as by land, Might be slaves to his will and despotic command. Fifteen years he withold dem from curbing deir foes, AVho plunder and search dem ; den, to add to deir woes, In place of redress would de convention impose. Brave Vernon resolve deir proud enemies' ruin ; But, instead of sending any forces to him, Both de French and Spanish fleets were let loose to undo him." This famous " motion" was the subject of several other cari- catures besides those mentioned above. One, entitled " The Funeral of Faction," was a satire on the opposition, and had beneath it the inscription " Funerals performed by Squire S s" [Sandys]. Two or three are too gross to bear a descrip- tion. The exultation of the ministerial party was shown also in a few ballads, and in pamphlets in prose and verse. The old comparison of Sisyphus, who toiled everlastingly without ap- proaching any nearer to the object of his labour, was again applied to the Patriots. But this comparison was no longer true, for the days of Wai- pole's reign were already numbered. Age was creeping upon the veteran statesman ; and that energy, with which for so many years he had discovered and defeated the intrigues of his enemies, seemed to be forsaking him. The Court party rated too high the triumph they had just obtained over the opposition, and lost themselves by their self-confidence. On the i3th of March the news of the taking of Porto Bello by Vernon came to raise up the spirits of his party. The admiral was selected at the same time for several towns in the general elections in May, which were carried on with great violence, and in which it was evident that the so-called " country interest" was gaining ground. The utmost influence of the Prince of Wales, the heir-apparent, was THE QUEEN OF HUNGARY. 133 exerted on this occasion. A print in compartments, entitled " The Humours of a Country Election," advertised in the news- papers of the 6th of May, 1 741, represents the general demeanour of the candidates for popular favour, and is thus described in the "explanation" beneath: "The candidates welcomed into the town by music and electors on horseback, attended by a mob of men, women, and children. The candidates saluting the women, and amongst them a poor cobbler's wife, very big with child, to whom they very courteously offer to stand godfather. The candidates very complaisant to a country clown, and offering presents to the wife and children. The candidates making an entertainment for the electors and their wives, to whom they show great respect. At the upper end of the table, the parson of the parish sitting, his clerk standing by him. The members elect carried in procession on chairs upon men's shoulders, with music playing before them, and attended by a mob of men, women, and children huzzaing them."* It will be seen that a great change had taken place since, under George I., complaints were first heard of the indecency of candidates soliciting the votes of the electors. The election at Westminster in 1741, at which Admiral Vernon was an unsuccessful candidate, being de- feated by a large majority, presented a scene of tumultuous riot, and was the subject of a parliamentary investigation, carried on with much warmth, at the opening of the ensuing session. It also was the subject of caricature. While faction was thus active at home, the affairs of the Con- tinent were becoming every day more confused and complicated. The French diplomatists, since the breaking out of the war between England and Spain, had been actively employed, and with some success, in forming an European confederacy against the former power, when new fuel was thrown into the flames by the death of the Emperor Charles VI., on the 2oth of October, 1 740. By the Pragmatic Sanction, guaranteed by all the great powers of Europe, the emperor was to be succeeded in all his hereditary states by his daughter Maria Theresa, who was usually spoken of in England by the title of Queen of Hungary. At first, the Elector of Bavaria, who laid claim to a large portion of the Austrian inheritance, alone opposed her succession, on the pretence that the female line could not legally inherit. Next, the King of Prussia revived some old claims to Silesia, and * It appears, by the advertisements in the newspapers, that this carica- ture was published separately, and also stitched up with a pamphlet upon the elections. 1 have not been able to meet with the pamphlet, but a copy of the caricature is in the collection of Mr. Burke. 134 THE BALANCING CAPTAIN. invaded it with a powerful army. The King of France was anxious to obtain a share in the spoils ; and, eventually, England was the only power which fulfilled its engagements towards the unfortunate queen, who, however, defended herself against the formidable confederacy with courage and resolution. In England the cause of Maria Theresa was very popular ; and when her claims were brought before the Parliament early in April, 1741, a subsidy of 300,000? was readily granted for her ; King George went over to Hanover, and assembled an army upon the Prussian frontier ; and Russia was also induced to support the injured queen. But, in spite of this assistance, the Prussian army met with an almost uninterrupted success, and Maria Theresa was forced to throw herself entirely upon the devotion of her Hun- garian subjects. France, anxious now not only to share in the spoils, but to effect the grand dream of the politics of Louis XIV., the entire destruction of the house of Austria, declared herself more openly, and French armies were poured into Germany. The King of England, suddenly overcome with fear for his Hanoverian dominions, concluded a neutrality for one year, and returned to England without having done anything for his ally. The French and Bavarians thereupon threw themselves into Austria, and penetrating into Bohemia, captured Prague before it could be relieved ; and there the Elector of Bavaria caused himself to be crowned King of Bohemia. Immediately after- wards, a diet assembled hurriedly at Frankfort elected him em- peror as Charles VII. He was crowned in the February of 1742, when the cause of the Queen of Hungary seemed almost hopeless. When the neutrality which George had accepted for Hanover became known in England, it raised the greatest excitement, and promised to give as strong a hold to the opposition as the convention, or even as the excise scheme. Numbers of pam- phlets and ballads placed before the public the wrongs and misfortunes of the persecuted queen ; and the English king was no more spared on this occasion than his ministers. In one ballad he was attacked under the title of the " Balancing Cap- tain,"* who yearly, under one pretence or another, took to Hanover (which had become a sort of bug-bear in English- men's ears) all the money he could raise among his English subjects. "I'll tell you a story as strange as 'tis new, Which all who're concern'd will allow to be true, * King George II., on account of his attachment to the army, was com inouly designated by the Jacobites as "the Captain." THE GIPSY. 135 Of a Balancing Captain, well known hereabouts, Returned home (God save him !) a mere king of clouts ! This captain he takes in a gold-ba.lla&ted ship, Each summer to terra damnosa a trip, For which be begs, borrows, scrapes all he can get, And runs his poor owners most vilely in debt. The last time he set out for this blessed place, He met them, and told them a most piteous case, Of a sister of his, who, though bred up at court, Was ready to perish for want of support. This Hun-gry sister, he then did pretend, Would be to his owners a notable friend, If they would at that critical juncture supply her. They did but, alas ! all the fat's in the fire !" In the sequel of the ballad, which is a remarkable example of the seditious violence that characterized many of these produc- tions, we are told that the Captain, having fingered the money, immediately made a peace with his sister's enemies, and left her to her fate : " He then turns his sister adrift, and declares Her most mortal foes were her father's right heirs. ' G d z ds ! ' cries the world, ' such a step was ne'er taken 1' 'Ob, ho !' says Noll Bluff, 'I have saved my own bacon " ' Let France damn the Germans, and undam the Dutch, And Spain on Old England pish ever so much ; Let Russia bang Sweden, or Sweden bang that, I care not, by Robert 1 one kick of my hat I ****** " ' Or should my chous'd owners begin to look sour, I'll trust to male Bob to exert his old power, Regit animot dictis, or nummis, with ease, So, spite of your growling, I'll act as I please !' " The conduct of the Captain is represented as calculated to bring ruin on his owners, unless they look more closely into his proceedings : "This secret, however, must out on the day When he meets his poor owners to ask for his pay ; And I fear, when they come to adjust the account, A zero for balance will prove their amount." The caricatures on the affairs of the Queen of Hungary were very numerous, both on the Continent and in England ; but the majority of the foreign ones appear to have been against her, while the English caricatures were all in her favour. In one, the background of which shews Prague bombarded, the Queen is represented as a ragged gipsy (a pun upon the French word 136 THE CARDINAL TURNED' PHYSICIAN. BoTie.mienne) kneeling before the King of France, to whom phe offers her jewels, with the prayer, "Sire, ayez pitie d'une pauvre BoTiemienne /" The King, who thinks them worthy of the acceptance of his favourite mistress, replies disdainfully, " Portez les a Pompadour." In another print, entitled "The Slough," of which there appeared seve- ral copies with slight varia- tions, the Queen of Hungary- is driven in a coach, with the King of France as coachman, Count Bruhl riding as postilion, and the new King of Poland holding on behind as lackey. They are running head foremost into a slough. The King of Prussia, who stands near in the character of a sentinel, asks, " Where are you going, Madame ?" The Queen, in evident consterna- tion, replies, "Ask my driver." In a third caricature, entitled " The Negotiators," the various powers who had interfered are represented as conspiring to ruin the Queen for their own ag- grandizement. In another, entitled " The Consultation of Physicians ; or, the Case of the Queen of Hungary," published A HOTAL GtPST. THE CUNNING PHYSICIAN. in February, 1742, the French minister, Cardinal Fleury, in tlie character of a cunning physician, after having administered a strong dose of emetic, which is evidently producing its effects, is proceeding to bleed her with his pen A print, entitled " French Pacification ; or, the Queen of Hungary stript," pub- lished also in the beginning of February, 1742, seems to have DECLINE OF WALPOL&S POWEI2. 137 had an especial popularity ; and a number of imitations ap- peared, some under the simple title of " The Queen of Hungary stripped." The Queen is here represented in a state of com- plete nudity, while the different continental powers are carrying off portions of her garments, bearing the names of the different provinces of her empire. Cardinal Fleury, more pitiless than any, is in the act of depriving her even of the slight covering afforded by her own hand. The treacherous conduct of France is severely pointed at in these caricatures, some of which are not quite delicate. In one print, of a rather later date, while England is courteously attempting to assist the Queen over a stile or gate, France takes the moment of defenceless exposure to proceed to unwarrantable liberties. In another, entitled, " The Parcae ; or, the European Fates," the intriguing cardinal CARDINAL "LACHESIS." is represented under the character of Lachesis, spinning the web of European politics, on a wheel which bears the title of " Universal Monarchy ;" while King George, as Atropos, is cut- ting the thread. It was in the midst of this hurly-burly abroad, that Walpole's power was at length broken. The minister had lost much strength in the elections of 1741, chiefly in Scotland and Cora- wall ; and in one way or other the opposition had succeeded in making him unpopular. Long before the session of Parliament was opened, the opposition papers spoke with more than ordi- KINO "ATBOPOS." 138 A MINISTERIAL MINORITY. nary confidence of success, and they became proportionally violent in their personal attacks. The mob was encou- raged, as they had been at the com- mencement of the reign of George I., to shew themselves on every favourable occasion. On the i2th of November Horace Walpole writes, " It is Admiral Vernon's birthday, and the city shops are full of favours, the streets of mar- row-bones and cleavers, and the night will be full of mobbing, bonfires, and lights ;" and he adds in a subsequent letter, " I believe I told you that Ver- non's birthday passed quietly, but it was not designed to be pacific ; for at twelve at night, eight gentlemen, dressed like sailors, and masked, went round Covent Garden with a drum, beating up for a volunteer mob ; but it did not take, and they retired to a great supper that was prepared for them at the Bedford Head, and ordered by White- head, the author of ' Manners.' " Walpole seems to have been himself full of apprehension, for his son, who returned from his travels just in time to witness his father's defeat, writes of him on the i pth of October, that he who in former times " was asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow, (for I have frequently known him snore ere they had drawn his curtains), now never sleeps above an hour without waking; and he, who at dinner always forgot he was minister, and was more gay and thought- less than all the company, now sits without speaking *and with his eyes fixed for an hour together. Judge if this is the Sir Robert you knew." The Parliament was opened on the 4th of December. On the i6th, on the election of a chairman of committees, by the deser- tion of some of his supporters and the absence of others, Wal- pole was in a minority of four. A day or two after he had only a majority of seven on an election petition ; and on another elec- tion petition he was again in a minority. The minister seemed to cling to power more than ever, now that he was on the point of losing it ; and, instead of taking the advice of his intimate friends, who urged him to resign, he made an unsuccessful at- tempt to gain over the Prince of Wales, and then resolved to make another effort to carry on in the House. On the 2ist of WALPOLE' S RESIGNATION. 139 January, after the Christmas holidays, Pulteney brought for- ward a motion with the same object as that of Sandys, which had been so triumphantly defeated not quite a year before. Walpole defended himself with as much vigour and eloquence as ever ; but the motion was rejected only by a majority of three. On the 28th of January, again, on an election petition, he was defeated by a majority of one. Walpole now made up his mind to resign, and the next day announced his intention to the King. On a division upon the same petition on the 2nd of February, the opposition majority had increased to sixteen. On the 3rd the Houses were adjourned, at the King's request, for a fort- night; on the pth Sir Robert Walpole was created Earl of Orford ; and on the nth he formally resigned all his places. The intelligence of Walpole's resignation was received in some towns in the country with ringing of bells and other demonstra- tions of joy ; and there were mobs and bonfires in London ; but, according to Horace Walpole, this feeling was much less general than might have been anticipated. The more violent of the opposition newspapers, however, teemed with ungenerous insults on the fallen minister : they held out threats of inquiry into his conduct, and talked of hunting him to the scaffold ; and they advised him to follow the example of Bolingbroke, in flying from his country. Walpole was almost the only commoner who had ever been admitted to the order of the Garter, and his blue ribbon was an especial object of envious attack. The Champion of February 16, 1742 (a more scurrilous paper even than the Craftsman), contains the following epigram, which may be taken as a sample of effusions to which the ex-minister was exposed daily : " Sir [Robert], his merit or interest to shew, Laid down the red ribbon * to take up the blue : By two strings already the knight hath been ty'd, But when twisted at [Tyburn], the third will decide." The more violent of the opposition went so far as to get peti- tions sent to the House, urging an impeachment ; and, in a moment of triumph and excitement, it is difficult to foresee what might have been the result of such a measure, had not the King stood firm to his old friend, and made it to a certain degree a condition of the accession of his enemies to power, that they should screen him from persecution. The Craftsman and the Champion continued to assail their old enemy with scurrilous * Sir Robert was created knight of the newly-revived order of the Bath, before he received that of the Garter. 140 THE MOB. insults : the latter paper, on the 2.3rd of February, in double allusion to his former influence among the monied and mercan- tile interests, and his later unpopularity in the city of London, published the following paragraph : " In regard to the good understanding which has so long subsisted between his late honor and the cify, it is hoped that that great man, in compli- ment to his old friends, will pass through the principal streets thereof at noon, in an open landau, on his way to his PALACE of H n." And the same violent journal, on the i;th of August, drags the veteran statesman from his retirement at Houghton : " From the neighbourhood of H n palace. We are informed that the annual NORFOLK CONGRESS is held there as usual (though the Gazetteer has not been authorized to set forth a list of the Powers of which it is composed) ; and that, if i\\Q puffs still continued in pay are to be depended upon, ways and means are already concerted to terminate the next winter's campaign as successfully as the last." When Walpole was created Earl of Orford, his daughter by his second wife, but born before their marriage, was given precedency as an Earl's daughter by a separate patent, a measure which raised a great storm among the aristocracy of the oppo- sition, and which excited odium even among the mob. An in- sulting poem, stated to be written by a lady of " real quality," was printed in folio, and distributed abroad, under the title of " Modern Quality ; an Epistle to Miss M W " [Maria Walpole]. This clamour, joined with the disappointment of the Tories and the young " Patriots," who were not allowed to share in the spoils, obliged the Court to agree, at the beginning of April, to the appointment of a secret committee to examine into the conduct -of Walpole during the last ten years of his admin- istration ; but the inquiry led to no results of any importance. The populace, however, seem to have been indulged with the hope of a new state tragedy. On the 8th of April, Horace Walpole writes : " All this week the mob has been carrying about his effigies in procession and to the Tower. The chiefs of the oppo- sition have been so mean as to give these mobs money for bon- fires, particularly the Earls of Lich field, Westmoreland, Den- bigh, and Stanhope. The servants of these last got one of these figures, chalked out a place for the heart, ami shot at it. You will laugh at me, who, the other day, meeting one of these mobs, drove up to it to see what was the matter. The first thing I beheld was a mawking in a chair, with three footmen, and a label on the breast, inscribed ' Lady Mary.' " The disappointment of Walpole's persecutors, when they saw THE SCREEN. 141 that there was no real intention of bringing him to what they called justice, showed itself in newspaper paragraphs and ill- natured caricatures. The old device of the screen was brought up again, and was the subject of more than one print. In one of these, entitled " The Night- Visit ; or, the Relapse ; with the pranks of Bob Fox the Juggler, while steward to Lady Brit, displayed on a screen," the ex-minister is represented in council with the King at night. George, seated at a table, demands of his old servant, " What is to be done ? " Walpole replies, " Mix and divide them." Several other courtiers are introduced, con- sulting on the change of af- fairs, one of whom, who overhears the conversation just alluded to, remarks, " 'Tis good advice !" Through the window are seen a party of men, who are not courtiers, gazing on the heathens with a telescope. One observes, " It must be a comet !" The other replies, " No, by Jove ! 'tis Robin Goodfellow from R chm d!" [Richmond]. I , A third exclaims, " I wish the Va telescope was a gun!" The screen, forming the back- ground of the picture, repre- sents all the evil deeds with which Walpole was charged, and which are described at length in the " Explanation " printed at the foot. The last compartment represents a distant view of the gallows, with an axe, and a head elevated on a pole, the doom of traitors. The devil, for (to judge by the caricatures) all parties seem to have been convinced that Satan was busy among them, peeps from behind the screen, and cries out exult- ingly, " Hah ! I shall have business here again !" This caricature is dated the 1 2th of April, 1 742. On the 1 6th of November following, when the cry against Walpole was still kept up, a caricature was published, entitled "Bob, the Political Balance-Master." The fallen minister is here decked in his coronet and seated at one end of a balance held up by Britannia, who sits mourning over sleeping trade. At the other end of the balance sits Justice, who is unable to weigh down effectually the bulky peer, assisted as he is by his bags of treasure; but, in spite of this help, his position GOOD ADVICE. THE POLITICAL BALANCE-MASTER. is critical, and in his terror he cries out to the Evil One, who appears above, " Oh ! help thy faithful servant Bob ! Sa- tan gives him a look anything but encouraging, and, holding out an axe, replies to his invo- cation, " This is thy due !" It was thus that party-spirit ' forgot, as it had so often done, the feelings of generosity and justice, and sought vengeance which could have no other object than that of gratifying personal hatred. Within no great length of time from these transactions, we shall find individuals, less powerfully defended, made sacrifices to the same unworthy spirit. THE BALANCE-MASTER IN DANGER. 143 CHAPTER V. GEORGE II. Ministerial Changes and Promotions Unpopularity of Lord Bath Battle of Dettingen New Changes, and the " Broad Bottom" The Rebellion of '45, and its Effects The City Trained Bands The Butcher The Westminster Elections New Changes in the Ministry Congress and Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle The Hostages New Ministerial Quarrels "Constitutional Queries " Death of the Prince of Wales. IN one of his speeches during the struggles in the House of Commons which preceded his fall, Walpole, analysing the strength of the opposition, had divided it into three classes, the Jacobites and Tories, the discontented Whigs, and the " Boys." The chiefs of the Tories in the House of Commons were Sir William Wyndham (now dead), " honest" Will. Shippen, and Sir John Hynde Cotton. The discontented Whigs were led in the Commons by Pulteney and Sandys, and in the Lords by Carteret and Argyle. Among the Boy Patriots the young men who were marching fast towards power were William Pitt, George Grenville, Sir George Lyttelton, and Henry Fox. In the moment of victory these discordant materials fell to pieces, and those who had individually done most towards driving Walpole's ministry out, the leaders of the old " Patriots," seemed now to think of nothing but providing for themselves. Pulteney, Carteret, and Sandys first secured places for them- selves, before they looked any farther; and then, intimidated by the threatening looks of their old colleagues, they found minor offices for a few of the others. The Duke of Newcastle, (Walpole's jealous and treacherous colleague), his brother Mr. Pelham and Sir William Youge were allowed to retain their places. Lord Wilmington was the nominal head of the new ministry ; Lord Carteret was appointed secretary of state, and, by flattering the King's propensities, soon engrossed the royal favour. Pulteney took no place himself, but before the end of the session he followed Walpole into the other House, by the title of Earl of Bath ; Sandys was made chancellor of the ex- chequer, and the Earl of Winchelsea was made first lord of tho admiralty. The King, who had made a cold reconciliation with the Prince of Wales, acceded to these arrangements with an T44 THE NEW MINISTRY. unwilling consent, and acted by the advice of Walpole, whom he consulted in secret. The position of the Monarch amid these changes is well described in a ballad, which made a great noise, published in the following October, and understood to have been written by Lord Hervey, one of the old ministers who had lost his place : "O England, attend, while thy fate I deplore, Rehearsing the schemes and the conduct of power ; And since only of those who have power I sing, I am sure none can think that I hint at the King. " From the time his son made him old Robin depose, All the power of a King he was well known to lose ; But, of ail but the name and the badges bereft, Like old women, his paraphernalia are left. " To tell how he shook in St. James's for fear, When first these new ministers bullied him there, Makes my blood boil with rage, to think what a thing They have made of a man we obey as a King." In the midst of the royal embarrassments Carteret comes to the Monarch's relief : "At last Carteret arriving, spoke thus to his grief : ' If you'll make me your doctor, I'll bring you relief. You see to your closet familiar I come, And seem like my wife in the circle at home.' "Quoth the King, 'My good lord, perhaps you've been told That I used to abuse you a little of old ; But now bring whom you will, and eke turn away, Let but me and my money and Walmoden stay.'* " * For you and Walmoden I freely consent, But as to your money, I must have it spent ; 1 have promised your son (nay, no frowns) should have some, Nor think 'tis for nothing we Patriots come.'" Carteret then goes on to declare the changes he must have in the ministry, who are to be turned out, and who to be kept in. Among the latter, the only one of any consequence was the Duke of Newcastle : " ' Though Newcastle's as false as he's silly, I know, By betraying old Robin to me long ago, As well as all those who employ'd him before, Yet I leave him in place, but I leave him no power. " For granting his heart is as black as his hat, With no more truth in this than there's sense beneath that ; * The King's mistress, who had been created an English peeress under the title of Countess of Yarmouth. George II. is in serious history, as well as in popular satire, represented as of a very aviiricious disposition. THE EAEL OF BATH. 145 Yet, as he's a coward, he'll shake when I frown You call'd him a rascal, I'll use him like one. " 'And since his estate at elections he'll spend, And beggar himself without making a friend ; So whilst the extravagant fool has a sous, As his brains I can't fear, so his fortune I'll use.' " Among the new men to be brought in, the most important is Pulteney " AH that weathercock Pulteney shall ask we must grant, For to make him a great noble nothing I want ; And to cheat such a man demands all my arts, For though he's a fool, he's a fool witli great parts. "And, as popular Clodius, the Pulteney of Rome, From a noble, for power, did plebeian become, So this Clodius to be a patrician shall choose, Till what one got by changing, the other shall lose. " The King is appeased by the flattery of his soldier-loving propensities : " ' For, your foreign affairs, bowe'er they turn out, At least I'll take care you shall make a great rout : Then cock your great hat, strut, bounce, and look bluff, For, though kick'd and cuff'd here, you shall there kick and cuff. " ' That Walpole did nothing they all used to say, So I'll do enough, but I'll make the dogs pay ; Great fleets I'll provide, and great armies engage, Whate'er debts we make, or whate'er wars we wage.' " With cordials like these, the Monarch's new guest Reviv'd his sunk spirits and gladden' d his breast ; Till in rapture he cried, ' My dear Lord, you shall do Whatever you will, give me troops to review.' " The new ministers were bitterly satirised in a caricature, en- titled "The Promotion," and in a clever ballad by Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, the great political balladist of the day, en- titled, " A New Ode to a great Number of great Men, newly made." The satire was most pointedly levelled at the new Lord Bath, who, in a few months, was exposed to more ridicule than his whole party had been able to heap upon Walpole during twenty years. He was everywhere looked upon as having be- trayed his party for the bribe of a coronet. Some said that he had been lured into the snare by Walpole ; others believed that he had been pushed into it by Carteret, who was jealous of his popularity ; while many supposed that he had been urged into it merely by the vanity and avarice of his wife, to whom they gave the satirical title of " The Wife of Bath," and a ballad made 146 LORD ORFORD'S COACHMAN. upon her under that title is said to have given the Earl great annoyance. It was the universal belief that Pulteney and his Patriot friends had purchased their elevation by an agreement to shield their predecessors, and to follow in their steps. A singular accident happened in July, which was quickly seized upon as a subject for a joke against the new ministers. "Last Sunday," Horace Walpole tells us in a letter of this period, " the Duke of Newcastle gave the new ministers a dinner at Claremont, where their servants got so drunk, that when they came to the inn over against the gate of New Park [now .Richmond Park, of which Lord Walpole was ranger], the coachman, who was the only remaining fragment of their suite, tumbled off the box, and there they were planted. There were Lord Bath, Lord Carteret, Lord Limerick, and Harry Furnese in the coach. They asked the innkeeper if he could contrive no way to convey them to town ; ' No,' he said, ' not he ; unless it was to get Lord Orford's coachman to drive them.' They demurred ; but Lord Carteret said, ' Oh, I dare say Lord Orford will willingly let us have him.' So they sent, and he drove them home." Horace says in the sequel of the letter, " Lord Orford has been at court again to-day : Lord Carteret came up to thank him for his coachman, the Duke of Newcastle standing by. My father said, ' My Lord, whenever the Duke is near overturning you, you have nothing to do but to send to me, and I will save you.' " The following ballad, attributed to Sir C. Hanbury Williams, was published on the occasion. Lord Bath, as the ex-writer in the Craftsman, retains his name of Caleb: the old coach and its driver, in the caricature of " The Motion," is not forgotten ; "THE OLD COACHMAN." " Wise Caleb and Carteret, two birds of a feather, Went down to a feast at Newcastle's together : No matter what wines or what choice of good cheer, Tis enough that the coachman had his dose of beer. Derry down, down, hey derry down. " Coming home, as the liquor work'd up in his pate, The coachman drove on at a damnable rate. Poor Carteret in terror, and scared all the while, Cried, ' Stop ! let me out ! is the dog an Argyle f Derry down, &c. " But he soon was convinced of his error ; for, lo I John stopt short in the dirt, and no further would go. When Carteret saw this, he observed with a laugh, ' This coachman, I find, is your own, my Lord Bath.' Derry down, &o. THE NEPOTISM. 147 "Now the peers quit their coach in a pitiful plight, Deep in mire, and in rain, and without any light ; Not a path to pursue, nor to guide them a friend What course shall they take then, and how will this end ? Derry down, &c. . " Lo ! Chance, the great mistress of human affairs, Who governs in councils, and conquers in wars ; Straight with grief at their case (for the goddess well knew That these were her creatures and votaries too), Derry down, &c. "This Chance brought a passenger quick to their aid, ' Honest friend, can you drive ?' ' What should ail me !' he said. ' For many a bad season, through many a bad way, Old Orford I've driven without stop or stay. Deny down, &c. ** ' He was once overturn'd, I confess, but not hurt.* Quoth the peers, ' It was we help'd him out of the dirt : This boon to thy master, then, prithee requite, Take us up, or here we must wander all night.' Derry down, &c. ** He took them both up, and through thick and through thin, Drove away for St. James's, and brought them safe in. Learn hence, honest Britons, in spite of your pains, That Orford, old coachman, still governs the reins. Derry down, &c." The Duke of Argyle had at first insisted upon forming a minis- try upon what he termed a "broad bottom," in which all classes of the old opposition were to have a place ; but this plan was overthrown by the King's determined hatred of the Tories, who therefore continued in the opposition. The young Patriots, after several vain attempts to obtain places in the new ministry, joined them, and were even more violent against Lord Bath, who had fast sunk into what Lord Hervey termed a " noble nothing," than the Tories themselves. This party of the oppo- sition, from their leaders being chiefly nephews and cousins of Lord Cobham, was sometimes designated as the " Nepotism." In the session of 1743 they renewed their attacks upon the old ministers, chiefly in the hope of embarrassing the new ones ; but the latter not only had with them the main body of their party, but they were supported by the adherents of Walpole, and they carried their measures by large majorities, and often without divisions. During 1743 and 1744 there was less political agita- tion than the country had seen for many years ; the old worn- out question of the Hanoverian troops and an act for the repeal of the Gin Act alone made any noise. Lord Bath bore the at- tacks of the press with far less equanimity than had been shown L a 148 BATTLE OF DETTINGEN. by Walpole, and complained bitterly of " scurrilous libels." To him was commonly attributed a pamphlet, published early iu 1743, under the title of "Faction detected," in which the oppo- sition and its organs were severely attacked, and which made much noise for a short time, being roughly handled in some of the opposition papers. At the close of the session the King went to Hanover, with his son the Duke of Cumberland and his now favourite minister Lord Carteret, and joined the army of English and Hanoverians under the Earl of Stair, which he had already ordered to cross the Rhine to assist the Queen of Hungary. The affairs of this Queen had, during the previous year, suddenly recovered from their desperate posture, and the French and Bavarians were now in their turn labouring under the reverses of war. England was nominally at peace with France, and her soldiers were only fighting under the banners of Austria. The Hanoverian army, which King George, the Duke of Cumberland, and Lord Carteret had just joined, was on its way to Hanau, when it was attacked at Dettingen by the French under the Duke de Noailles, who were signally defeated. A battle on land gained by English troops was a new thing in England, for there had been no war of any importance sinoe the days of Marlborough, and the whole country resounded with exultation. Dettingen was in a mo- ment the theme of every ambitious or popular scribbler, and pamphlets in prose and verse, ballads and songs, and epigrams, were showered upon the public. But amid this apparently uni- versal joy were sown the seeds of political disagreement. The English troops were without provisions, and in an ill condition to fight ; and, though they did fight bravely, their loss had been severe. They complained that they had not been properly supported ; for the horse, which was chiefly Hanoverian, had not behaved so well in the battle as the foot. The commander-in- chief, Lord Stair, had strongly urged that the enemy should be pursued ; but his opinion was overruled by that of the foreign generals. A second remonstrance, after the troops had been re- freshed, was equally unsuccessful ; and the Earl, with several other officers, threw up their commissions in disgust, and re- turned to England, where a great outcry was immediately raised. On the 22nd of October was published a caricature, under the title of " The Hanoverian Confectioner-General," in which the French are represented as flying from the field hotly pursued by the British. The former cry out " S'ils nous poursuivent, nous sommes perdu !" The Earl of Stair, urging on the pursuit, shouts, " Pursue 'em, lads ! and mow 'em awe !" The King, as THE THREE JOHNS. 149 the Hanoverian horse, riding on the starved British lion (a hard hit, as the discontented party had always said that England was starved to fatten Hanover,) cries out to the Hanoverian ca- valry, " La victoire est gagnee, ou vous etes vous fourres ?" Their commander replies, "N'im- porte, j'ai conserve nos gens ;" while his soldiers exclaim, " We will not be commanded by the English. An Austrian comman- der, who is equally urging the pursuit, calls them "cowardly mercenaries." A label from the lion's mouth bears the words " Starv'd on Bonpournicole." The opposition, and many ( who were not actually in opposi- tion, rejoiced in these divisions ; they talked ironically of making THB BRITISH UON OCT OF ORDKR - Carteret commander-in-chief (he is said to have remained in his carriage in the neighbourhood of the battle all the day, without showing any fear, and he wrote a vaunting despatch) ; and jokes passed about on the trio of successive Johns John Duke of Argyle, who had refused the place because he was not allowed to bring any Tories into the ministry, John Earl of Stair, and John Lord Carteret. The following lines "on the Johns" ap- peared in some of the papers : " John Duke of Argyle We admired for a while, Whose titles fell short of his merit. His loss to repair, We took John Earl of Stair, Who like him had both virtue and merit. "Now he too is gone ; Ah ! what's to be done ! Such losses how can we supply ! But let's not repine ; On the banks of the Rhine There's a third John his fortune will try. " By the Patriots' vagary He w: 8 m de S ; [secretary] By himself he's P M [prime minister] made ; 1 50 THE TRIUMVIRATE. And now, to crown all, He's made G 1, [general] Though he ne'er was brought up to the trade. At the same time the death of Lord "Wilmington, who had presided at the Treasury board, gave rise to new changes in the ministry, in which Lord Orford's secret influence soon overthrew the schemes of Carteret and Lord Bath. Pelham, who had held the office of Paymaster of the forces, became first Lord of the Treasury, and was allowed to bring into inferior places his friends Henry Fox and Lord Middlesex. Lord Gower resigned the Privy Seal, which was given to Lord Cholmondeley. Pelham also obtained the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer, which was taken from Sandys, who was appeased with a place in the household and a peerage. The following verses on "the Trium- virate" in the London Magazine for January, 1744, (the maga- zine which had been set up in opposition to the Gentleman's JUagazine, and which had been from the first the monthly advo- cate of the country party,) show the public estimation in which Carteret, Sandys, and Pulteney (Lord Bath) stood at that time : "John, Sam, and Will combined of late To form a new triumvirate ; To share authority and money, Like Caesar, Lepidus, and Toney. But mark what followed from this union : John left his countrymen's communion, And, though in office he appear'd, Was neither honour'd, lov'd, or fear'd. Sam in the sunshine buzz'd a little ; 1 hen sank in power, and rose in title. Will with a title out would set, But place or power ne'er could get. So Will and Sam obscure remain'd, And John with general odium reign "d." Towards autumn it became publicly known that serious dis- sensions existed in the Cabinet between Carteret, who had now by his mother's death become Earl Granville, and the Pelhams ; and, in the sequel, the Duke of Newcastle and his brother com- pelled the King to dismiss Granville, who had lost his political influence, on the 23rd of November. Lord Winchelsea, General Cavendish, and the other Lords of the Admiralty, with some other inferibr placemen, also resigned. The Pelhams now effected their long- projected plan of a " broad-bottomed" cabinet. Lord Harrington succeeded to the place of Lord Granville ; the Jacobite Sir John Hynde Cotton was made Treasurer of the Chamber in the royal household; the Tory Lord Gower was ADMIRALTY APPOINTMENTS. 151 made Privy Seal ; Lyttelton obtained a seat at the Treasury board ; Bub Dodington was appointed Treasurer' of the Navy ; Pitt joined in supporting the Government, on the promise of being made Secretary at War as soon as the King's personal an- tipathy could be overcorile ; and Lord Chesterfield, who was also personally disliked by the King, was made Lord Lieutenant of Ireland ; the Duke of Bedford was made first Lord of the Admi- ralty, with the Earl of Sandwich as second Commissioner ; and Mr. Grenville was made one of the junior Lords of the same board. The arrangement of the Admiralty seems to have given most difficulty from the number of applicants ; and it formed the subject of a caricature, entitled " Next Sculls at the Admiralty," published on the 2jth of December, 1744, which contains a number of figures, all evidently intended for portraits. In the back is a view of the Admiralty, with Winchelsea, Cavendish, and their col- leagues " going out." Win- chelsea, with his character- istic spectacles, advances forwards, gravely observing, "We shall see," (apparently intended as a pun upon his name ;) while Cavendish, with his hand raised to his mouth in the attitude of bidding adieu, and exclaim- ing "I must eat," turns off to one side. One of the groups in front, of those who are " coming in," or wanting to come in, represents to the left the Duke of Bedford in GOING OUT. a stooping posture, exclaiming " Bed for 't." In the middle the tall upright figure of Anson, who had in the course of the year arrived from his circumnavigation of the world, says, " Round the world and not in."* Before him, an older man resting on a staff, but not so easily identified, cries out " Next scull !" In this " broad-bottomed" coalition every party, except the small number of adherents of Carteret and Lord Bath, had a represen- tative ; and the consequence was, that, during the ensuing ses- * Anson had a rough unpolished manner, and it was said jokingly of him, that he had been all round the world, but not in it. He Lad amassed great wealth by his voyage. i5 POPULAR DISSATISFACTION. gion, there was scarcely a division. Lord Orford, who had been called to town by the King to give him his advice in his minis- COMINQ IN. terial embarrassments, returned to Houghton, and died there on the i8th of March, 1745. This " broad-bottomed" ministry had, however, very little substantial unanimity in itself ; the chief tie by which its mem- bers were linked together seems to have been the mere love of place, to which they had sacrificed the principles that many of them had been supporting boisterously for so many years ; and, f there was not much opposition in the House, there was abun- dance of dissatisfaction without. During the formation of this ministry, Horace Walpole represents the aspirants to place as standing like servants at a country fair to be hired ; and he adds, '' One has heard of the corruption of courtiers ; but, believe me, the impudent prostitution of patriots, going to market with their honesty, beats it to nothing. Do but think of two hundred men, of the most consummate virtue, setting themselves to sale for three weeks !" Within a few days after the publication of the caricature mentioned above, on the ijjth of January, ap- peared a "New Ballad," entitled the " Place-book ; or, the Year 1745," which was soon followed by a bitter lampoon on the people in power, under the title of "The Triumvirate ; or, broad- bottomry." Several other caricatures, among which we may particularize one, entitled "The Claims of the Broad-bottoms," exhibit the venality complained of by Horace Walpole. The ministry soon became distracted by internal jealousies and dis- REBELLION OF '45. 153 sensions ; and these, with the disappointments of the old Tories, again raised the spirit of Jacohitism, which had been so long kept under by the policy of Sir Robert Walpole. The partizans of the exiled family abroad were further encouraged by the battle of Fontenoy, which, though not inglorious to the British, arms, was a defeat, and was exaggerated beyond measure in France, Spain, and Italy. In the summer of 1745 the minstrel of the north began again to chant aloud his hatred to King George and the Whigs, and his wishes for the return of the Stuarts. The arrival of Prince Charles Edward, the young Pretender, on the coast of the high- lands of Scotland, in the latter days of July, was the signal for the rising of the clans, and he soon found himself at the head of an army, the more formidable, because the authorities in Scot- land were taken by surprise, and not only that country but England itself were in no posture of defence. Having passed the small English army under Sir John Cope, the Pretender entered Perth in triumph on the 4th of September ; and in the middle of the same month, still leaving Cope behind him, he obtained possession of Edinburgh. On the 2ist Cope was defeated in the brief but celebrated battle, known as that of Preston Pans, from whence, with a small portion of his army, he fled to Berwick, and Scotland was left almost in the power of the rebels. After re- maining some time in Edinburgh, the castle of which was still in the hands of the English garrison, the Pretender began his March on the ist of November, with an army considerably rein- forced by new supplies of Highlanders, towards the English borders, and, crossing the Tweed at Kelso, moved directly into Cumberland ; and the Scots made themselves masters of Carlisle on the 1 5th, and, proceeding into Lancashire, they reached Preston on the 27th and Wigan on the 28th, and the same day an advanced party entered Manchester. By this time, however, the royal troops were in motion, numerous volunteers were armed in most of the southern and eastern counties, and Dutch and English troops, under the Duke of Cumberland, had been hastily brought over from the Continent ; so that by the time the rebels had reached Derby, they became aware of the perils with which they were surrounded, and began a rapid retreat, closely pursued, towards Scotland. Prince Charles re-crossed the border on the aoth of December, and his army was collected together at Glasgow by the end of the year. On the i^th of January the English troops in Scotland met with as signal a defeat on Fal- kirk Moor as they had previously experienced at Preston Pans; but better troops and more experienced commanders were rapidly 154 CARICATURES AGAINST THE PRETENDER. approaching the scene of action, and the hopes of the Jacobites in Scotland were destined to have a speedy and fatal con- clusion. In England the contradictory and vague information daily spread abroad caused the greatest consternation, ill concealed even to us by the contemptuous manner in which the press generally treated the rebellion. The citizens of London showed their fears rather than their courage by their anxious precautions ; and their alarm was so great on the day when intelligence was brought of the advance of the rebels to Derby, and of their con- sequent position between the Duke of Cumberland's army and the metropolis, as to cause it to be long remembered as the "Black Friday." A rush was made upon the Bank, the fatal effects of which it is said to have escaped only by the expedient of refusing to pay in any other coin than sixpences, which enabled the directors to gain time until the panic was over. The songs of exultation and scorn which resounded in Scotland were, however, replied to by satirical caricatures and loyal songs, of which there was no want in the south. In one of the former the British lion is represented as the true support of King George and the Protestant succession against the designs of the French King. The Pretender addresses the King of France, the Pope, and the devil, who were looked upon popularly as the grand encouragers of this enter- prize, " We shall never be a match for George, while that lion stands by him." The popularity of the Pretender was not assisted in England by the belief that he was bringing with him the religious principles of Rome and the political principles of France. The feeling on this subject is strongly exhibited in a caricature, entitled "The Invasion; or, Perkin's triumph," in which the Pre- tender is represented triumphantly dri- ving in the royal stage-coach, drawn by six horses, which are named Superstition, Passive Obedience, Rebellion, Hereditary THE PROTESTANT CHAMPION. llight> Arbitrary Power, and Non-Re- sistance, and riding over Liberty and all the public funds. The Pope acts as postilion, and the King of France as coachman ; two monkeys and the devil perform the office of footmen, and various disastrous consequences of the success of the rebellion are represented in different parts of the picture. A group of Scot- CARICATURES AGAINST THE PRETENDER. 155 tish soldiers follow a standard, on which are figured a pair of wooden shoes and the motto "Slavery." St. James's palace occupies the background, with Westminster Abbey on one side, and on the other Smithfield and a martyr at the stake. This print was from the pencil and graver of C. Mosley. Another print is entitled "Britons' Association against the Pope's Bulls," and was published on the 2ist of October, 1745. The river Tweed divides the picture in two. On one side the Pretender is trying to force over the river an importation of bulls, from the mouths and nostrils of which issue lightning mixed with decretals, " massacres," " rods and whips," " everlasting curses," the " fire of purgatory," &c. The Pretender, with the exclamation " Now or never!" holds by the horns, and drags towards the river, a bull laden with indulgences, penances, confessions, absolutions, holy water, and a whole cargo of such Popish furniture. In the distance, Edin- burgh Castle appears, well manned with loyal troops, and beneath it a AN POBTATION. group of Highlanders following their standard with some reluctance, their different opinions showing the want of una- nimity in the directors of the rebellion. One says "I'll go home !" while his companion cries " To Newcastle !" and the recommendation of a third to " Cross the Tweed" is backed by the words " Good plunder !" uttered by another. The devil, booted and spurred, and mounted on a broomstick, approaches this group, and accuses them of treason, adding, " I'll tell France, Spain, and the Pope." The other side of the picture represents a troop of volunteers, issuing from a city gate, (perhaps intended to represent London,) and preparing to hin- der the Pretender from invading their land. They are led by a man armed with a spear and equipped as a commander, who proclaims, somewhat ostentatiously, " I am your independent officer!" One, who does not seem very eager in advancing, cries, "King and country! Shop and family!" A drummer says, " I wont go out of the parish !" His next companion, with more valour, exclaims, " O God, I'd go five miles to fight !" while another moves on rather doggedly, with an exclamation of regret, " I wish they'd go to dinner !" This portion of the BEITANNIA LEARNING TO DANCE. print appears intended to convey no very flattering picture of the courage and zeal which are supposed to have characterized the volunteer defenders of their country in this pressing emergency. In the dis- tance we have a view of the ocean covered with British shipping, and Britannia seated on an islet and encouraged by Neptune. This print, which is tolerably well executed, and is a fair example of the style of caricatures of this period, is ac- companied by the following verses, more remarkable for reason than rhyme: " I Perkin, young and bold, My father me has sent here ; He is himself too old, And tim'rous, too, to venture. "His spirit sad '15 To break did much contribute, When many friends were seen To grace the fatal gibbet. " He open'd then his coffers, And shew'd 'era what rewards To those he freely offers, Who seize the king and guards. " Pack up your awls, and post, And homewards wisely run ; Or in a month at most, By GEORGE, you'll be undone t " AN INDEPENDENT OFFICER. BRITANNIA DANCING TO A NEW TUNE. THE PLAGUES OF ENGLAND. 157 Another caricature published at this period was entitled " The Plagues of England ; or, the Jacobites' Folly," and was aimed especially at the conduct of our French allies on this occasion. The Pope, the devil, and the Pretender are here raised up as idols, and worshipped by Jacobite devotees. The King of France acts as fiddler, while Britannia is seen dancing to a French tune, led by Folly, who is carrying Poverty on his back. Behind them, Industry lies " neglected" and almost famished. A satirical me- dal, in the collection of Mr. W. D. Haggard, represents on the reverse the same personages as those which the caricatures figure as the prime movers of the rebellion (the Pope, the devil, and their associates), here overcome by BEBELLION DEFEATED. the force of truth. The obverse exhibits a bust of the King in armour, with the inscription " GEOEGIUS II. D. G. REX." A caricature, which had been published in the March of this year, when the Jacobite rising was already foreseen, but it was at least wished to be believed that the grand conciliation of " broad-bottomry " would be a sufficient defence against it, re- presented the King on his throne, attended by his two sons, the Prince of Wales, and the Duke of Cumberland. On each side, the Lords and Commons are offering their swords and fortunes for the defence of the crown. In the foreground, a party of Jacobite conspirators are unmasking themselves and taking to fight. One cries, " All's lost !" another, " Detected !" a third, "D n their unanimity!" and so on. On the walls of the apartment are two pictures, one representing English bull-dogs fighting among themselves ; while, in the other, they are united in attacking a bull, distinguished as " the Pope's bull ;" the in- scription which runs under the two paintings is, " English bull- dogs, united against the enemy." This print, entitled " Court and Country united against the Popish Invasion," is dated the 6th of March, 1744 (i.e. 1744-5). This unanimity, however specious in appearance, was but an imaginary one, and we shall soon find the pretended patriotism of ministers and placemen giving way to their personal interests and jealousies in the very midst of the dangers which threatened their country. The question of national rights and liberties, which wise men saw involved, was looked upon as a secondary matter by those whose only banner was political or religious party, or the still more unworthy one of place and emolument. 158 SIB JOHN COPE AND THE ROYAL TROOPS. In a print which appeared in the autumn of 1745, under the title of " A Hint to the Wise ; or, the surest way with the Pretender," the church militant is represented on one side offer- ing but a weak resistance to the Pretender, while the standard of broad-bottom, set up by the courtiers against the Jacobites, promises no great strength of resistance, but the mass of the people crowd together to fight successfully under the banner of liberty. The Church was represented by Herring, Archbishop of York, who, after the defeat of Sir John Cope at Preston Pans, had exhibited extraordinary activity in raising and review- ing in person the volunteers of his diocese, though his troops did no great service in the sequel. The warlike prelate is re- presented in a caricature, entitled " The Mitred Soldier ; or, the Church militant." The raising of volunteers was carried on with the more activity, as it was made a profitable job even by many of the nobility, who obtained the pay of officers in the army. In one county the fox-hunters were formed in a corps and armed. One of the Scottish Jacobite (or at least semi- Jacobite) songs of the day gives the following amusing descrip- tion of the forces collected together from all quarters to suppress the rebellion : " Horse, foot, and dragoons, from lost Flanders they call, With Hessians and Danes, and the devil and all ; And hunters and rangers led by Oglethorpe ; And the Church, at the bum of the Bishop of York. And, pray, who so fit to lead forth this parade, As the babe of Tangier, my old grandmother Wade T Whose cunning's so quick, but whose motion's so slow, That the rebels march' d on, while he stuck in the snow !" Cope himself, the object of so much satire in the Scottish Jacobite songs, was not spared in the English caricatures, one of which, entitled " A race from Preston Pans to Berwick," is accompanied by a parody on the well-known old ballad against Sir John Suckling. Among the many whose behaviour at this time exposed them to satire, the Duke of Newcastle, whose conduct as minister had made him a general object of derision, was not spared ; he was well known to be attached to the plea- sures of the table, and was one of the few who then kept French cooks, and on his own cook, named Cloe, who was both a French' man and a Catholic, he set especial store : it was pretended that this hero of the kitchen would be included in the proclamation ordering Papists and others to be removed from the metropolis, and the chagrin of the Duke was portrayed in a caricature, entitled "The Duke of Newcastle and his (French) Cook," in DUTCH NEUTRALITY. 159 which the Duke is made to exclaim " Cloe ! if you leave me, I shall be starved !" This rebellion, while it caused in England more fear than hurt, had been a very advantageous diversion for our enemies abroad, and our foreign relations were suffering considerably. Even the Dutch had entered into a neutrality, and gave no further assistance than they were absolutely obliged to do by the strict words of existing treaties. A caricature, published on THE BENEFIT OF NEUTRALITY. the z6th of December, 1745, under the title of " The Benefit of Neutrality," was especially directed against our allies of Holland. France, Spain, and England were represented as struggling to obtain more shadowy advantages, while Holland in the meantime was enriching herself with the substance : " Ambitious France and haughty Spain Unite, the horns of power to gain ; Against them England drags the tail, While the sly Dutchman fills his pail." In the beginning of the year 1746 the war in Scotland con- tinued to be carried on in the same careless and unskilful man- ner, which, in the previous year, had chieQy contributed to the temporary success of the insurrection, until, towards the end of January, the Duke of Cumberland was sent to the north to take the command of the English forces. The Prince had scarcely arrived in Scotland, when he received intelligence that the dis- content of persons and party in the South had broken out in a ministerial revolution. Lord Granville still enjoyed in private the King's favour and confidence, and was suspected of secretly thwarting many of the ministerial measures. It was said to 160 THE GAME OF BOB-CHERRY. have been by his advice that the King neglected the Scottish rebellion so long, and thus allowed it to gain head. The minis- ters, on the other hand, eager to get rid of Granville's influence, made an attempt to turn out those of that party who still re- mained in office, and bring in more of their own supporters. The King refused to accede to their wishes on this point, and, perceiving from other symptoms that Lord Granville's party was intriguing against them, on the loth of February the Pelham administration resigned. Lord Granville madly under- took to form a new administration, and Lord Bath accepted the Treasury and Exchequer, Lord Carlisle the Privy Seal, and Lord Winchelsea returned to the Admiralty. But this strange ad- ministration went no further, for its chief, finding himself with- out influence in the Houses, and seeing that it was impossible to carry on, made a sudden retreat, after having remained in power only three days. The old administration were restored imme- diately to their places, and the King, feeling his own weakness, gave up his friend Granville to their resentment, and allowed them to bring in those whom, a few days before, he had posi- tively refused to admit to his councils. Among these was William Pitt, who was making rapid strides towards that emi- nence and popularity which has given him so much celebrity as Earl of Chatham. One of the best caricatures relating to these transactions was published in March, un- der the title of " The noble Game of Bob- cherry, as it was lately played by some unlucky boys at the Crown, in St. James's parish." It appears to have been a very popular print, for there are two or three different copies of it, probably pirated editions, with some variations in the figures and grouping. The would-be ministers are represented as jumping at offices represented by cherries, whilst the chief members of the late administration and some of their friends are looking on. Lord Winchelsea, known by the capa- cious wig for which he was celebrated, and his spectacles, is making a jump at a cherry labelled as Secretary of State. Lord Bath has just made an unsuccessful attempt at another, which is labelled " High Treasurer ;" and Chief Justice BOB CJIERHY. Willes is preparing to jump at one marked BATTLE OF CULLODEN. 161 " High Chancellor." The Earl of Granville, who had swallowed a cherry marked <; Secretary of State," is seized with a fit of sickness, which obliges him to disgorge it. Behind him stands the old Tory and half Jacobite, Sir John Hynde Cotton, holding a cherry in his hand, and looking with a smile at the efforts of the eager can- didates for the others. Cotton had already obtained a place in the ministry, and he seems to have cared little for the changes which were taking place. William Pitt and Mr. Walpole are standing by, laughing at the vain efforts of the candidates for cherries ; and on the other side of the picture the two brothers and ex-ministers, the Duke of Newcastle and Mr. Pelham, are look- ing quietly on. Among the numerous political pamphlets and prints brought forth by this sufficiently ridiculous trans- action, we may specify, " A History of the Long Administration," published in a very diminutive size, "price one penny." The Duke of Cumberland, who was warmly attached to the old Whig prin- ciples, to which he looked for the support of his House on the throne, aud who had been alarmed by the intelligence of the ministerial crisis, was relieved from all his fear?, when, a few days afterwards, he heard of the restoration of the Pelhams, and he proceeded vigorously with the work with which he was now entrusted in the north. The fear and anxiety which had so long prevailed throughout England were entirely expelled by the news of the sanguinary and decisive battle of Culloden, fought on the 1 6th of April ; and for several weeks the English papers and prints were filled with nothing but congratulatory poems and songs on the Duke of Cumberland, and satires on the un- fortunate Scots ; and these subjects, with the trials and execu- tions of the rebels, occupied public attention through this and a great part of the following year. It need hardly bs stated that the weak, and we may probably add worthless, Pretender, after passing through many dangers and hardships, disappointed his enemies by making good his escape to France. One of the English ballads sums up his enterprise, by telling us punningly that A CHERRT IN HAND. i6a AGITATION IN LONDON. " His descent was from Sky,* as thereby he'd declare, His design was strange castles to build in the air." London had, during these events, presented a strange physiog- nomy. With perhaps more general excitement, there was less of street-mobbing than in 1715 ; but the consciousness of dan- ger seems to have been stronger. The pamphlet shops were filled with tracts against Popery and tyranny, and similar pub- lications were hawked about the streets ; and the newspapers spread abroad daily a new cargo of exciteable matter. The Penny London Post, for example, had the words " No Preten- der ! No Popery ! No slavery ! No arbitrary power ! No wooden shoes !" printed round its margins in conspicuous let- ters. Prints, exhibited in the shop windows, represented the Popish cruelties and massacres, the ceremony of cursing by bell, book, and candle, and a variety of similar performances, which, it was said, were to be re-enacted on the Pretender's arrival in the metropolis. In the beginning of 1746, although the Pre- tender had returned to Scotland, yet people were so far from believing that the danger was entirely averted, that the news- papers and magazines gave directions and illustrative figures for exercising volunteers in the use of their arms. The gates of London were regularly closed at an early hour in the evening, and the city trained bands were kept in constant movement. Troops, both regulars and volunteers, were brought together in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, and a strong camp was formed on Finchley Common to protect this part of the king- dom from danger. Yet, in spite of all these precautions and preparations, Jacobite agents were actively employed in spread- ing sedition even in London : numbers of people were arrested, as iu 1715, for drinking the health of the Pretender; ballad- women and low persons were seen vending seditious papers, not only in the streets of London, but in the very heart of the camp ; and, in the latter, agents of the Pretender were actually detected in attempting to seduce the soldiers from their duty. It is not surprising, that, in such a state of things, the victory of Culloden should have given universal and deep-felt joy, and that the victor should have become widely popular throughout England. Within a few months the Duke of Cumberland's head was a tavern sign in every country town ; and his name contri- buted to give popularity to one of the prettiest of our common garden- flowers. Some verses, current at this time, told us that * The Young Pretender first put foot on Scottish ground in the Isle of Skye. SWEET- WILLIAM. 1 63 " The pride of France is lily white ; The rase in June is Jacobite : The prickly thistle of the Scot Is northern knighthood's badge and lot ; But, since the Duke's victorious blows, The lily, thistle, and the rose All droop and fade, all die away, Sweet- William, only rules the day No plant with brighter lustre grows, Except the laurel on his brows." " The agreeable Contrast between the British Hero and the Italian Fugitive," a caricature published shortly after this event, represents the Pretender on one side, his hopes defeated and broken, and on the other the portly Duke, who exclaims, "Britain gave me life; for her safety I will readily risk it!" Underneath is inscribed the distich " Here happy Britain tells her joyful tales, And may again since William's arm prevails." It was this period of agitation which suggested to Hogarth the admirable picture of the march of the guards to Finchley, on their way to the north against the Scots. The disorder and want of discipline, which characterized the movements of the troops on this occasion, are shewn in the most striking manner. Here you have a group in which the actors appear unconscious of the riot and confusion with which they are surrounded : it repre- sents, we are told, a French spy, who is communicating to a dis- guised Jacobite a letter of in- telligence, announcing that the King of France had sent ten thousand men to the assistance of his party. There, theft and dishonesty and licentiousness, though on a small scale, tell us but too plainly of the low moral character of the British army little more than a century ago. Here, again, a sturdy grenadier is exposed to a disagreeable cross-fire from a brace of females, who are selling ballads. An old explanation of this engraving states that these are the soldier's wife, whom he has deserted, and a woman whom he has deceived, and that they are upbraiding him for his treachery and inconstancy ; but they are M a PRIVATE INTELLIGENCE. 164 CITY TRAINED BANDS. evidently two ballad-singers of different political parties, for one carries a paper inscribed "God save our noble King," and a print of the Duke of Cumberland, while the other holds up a number of the Remembrancer, a journal in opposition to the Govern- ment. Hogarth's print was given to the world in 1750, several years after the events it commemorates: the paint- ing was exhibited to George II., as it is said, at that monarch's own request ; but his only feeling appears to have been that of anger, that his favourite soldiers should be exposed to ridicule, and he returned it without an observation. Hogarth, in- dignant at the little patro- nage he received from the Court, satirically dedicated his engraving to the King of Prussia. There were, however, soldiers exposed to much greater ridicule than those who on this occasion marched through Finchley, or even than those who had fled at Preston and Falkirk, and those were the warriors of the city companies, the trained bands of London. The municipal troops of the capital, which had presented so formidable an array in the middle ages, and which had acted no unimportant part in the civil commotions of the seventeenth century, had dege- nerated from their ancient character ; but they still continued to be mustered and exercised for the defence of the metropolis, and during the earlier part of the century they had been from time to time drawn out in the outskirts of the town to perform battles and sieges, in harmless imitation of the movements of the more dangerous armies on the Continent. They were especially active during the first years after the accession of the House of Hanover to the English throne, and the newspapers of that period contain frequent paragraphs detailing satirically their pretended exploits. As late as the year 17.31, Read's Weekly Journal, of September n, announces, that, " On Tuesday, the Cripplegate, Whitechapel, CROSS-FIRE. F.W.Fairliolt.F S A CITY CITY TRAINED BANDS. 165 St. Clement's, and Southwark grenadiers rendezvous'd in Bridgewater Gardens ; from whence they marched through the city, and afterwards attacked Cripplegate, both posterns, and Great Moorgate, with their usual bravery, and thence pro- ceeded to attack a dunghill near Bunhill Fields, which gloriously completed their exercise of arms." We have already seen these domestic troops, in a caricature on the invasion of the Pretender, exhibited as loving better the enjoyments of home than the rude service of war. They figure in the last plate of Hogarth's series of the " Idle and industrious Appren- tices," and in several caricatures of the time. In one of these, in the collection of Mr. Burke, (without date or title,) these city troops appear, some of them, armed with pipes as well as guns ; others on duty in undress, and some deficient of legs and eyes. A large and rather well-drawn cari- cature, also in the possession of Mr. Burke, and of which the accompa- nying engraving is a reduced copy, represents these troops under the cha- racters of different animals, led by the self-important and ponderous elephant, with the hog for a standard-bearer, their device being the good roast beef and ^-//^ plum pudding of Old England. They are ^^ assembled at the sign of the Hog-in- Armour,* and one of the troop carries a TBAINED BANDS. bill with the proclamation " Come, taylers and weavers, And sly penny shavers, All haste and repair To the Hog in Kag Fair, To 'list in the pay Of great Captain Day, And you shall have cheer, Beef, pudding, and beer." Underneath this print, which is dated in 1749, are the lines : * There was an inn with the sign of the Hog-in-Armour on Saffron HilL It may be observed, that, as the figures are all lelt-handed, and the city arms reversed, the artist probably drew the sketch on copper without reversing it ; so that, as far as it may be supposed to represent a locality, it is reversed in the print. This w;is an ordinary practice with Hogarth, many of whose priuts are thus reversed. 1 66 WILLIAM PITT. " Hark, now the drum assaults our ears, Thus beating up for volunteers ; Who fight, besiege, and storm amain, And yet are never hurt or slain. Sad work ! should this tame army meet The late pacific Spithead fleet."* As the danger of the Eebellion passed over, the Pelham administration, shaken internally by personal jealousies and intrigues, began to be assailed from without by the outcries of a violent, if not a powerful opposition. It was supported by its great parliamentary influence, which the accession of William Pitt to office had rendered complete ; and it was carried on with quite as much corruption as had ever characterized the govern- ment of Sir Robert Walpole. The breaking out of the Rebellion had furnished an excuse for the repeal of the Habeas Corpus Act ; and the power thus obtained being exercised more frequently against those who attacked the ministry than against the enemies of the Crown, had increased the unpopularity of the former. William Pitt, who had not long touched a legacy of io,oooZ., left him by the old Duchess of Marlborough for his " patriotic " opposition to the favourite measures of the Hanoverian dynasty, followed the example of so many patriots who had preceded him, and was assailed on every side for the " unembarrassed countenance " with which he suddenly, on his admission to office, advocated the very measures he had been condemning so long and with so much perseverance. In the caricatures of the day, the ghost of the deceased Duchess is represented as reproaching him for his apostacy. The " unembarrassed countenance " was the subject of a caricature and of a ballad. The latter sneers at the eloquence of " a fellow who could talk and could prate," and tells us how, before his accession to the ministry, " He bellow'd and roar'd at the troops of Hanover, And swore they were rascals who ever went over ; That no man was honest who gave them a vote, And all that were for them should hang by the throat. Derry down, &C.** By his apparent zeal in this cause he soon extended his popularity through the land. " By flaming so loudly he got him a name, Though many believed it would all end in shame ; * Alluding to a recent naval expedition, which had returned without per- forming any exploit of consequence. THE " UNEMBARRASSED COUNTENANCE" 167 But nature had given him, ne'er to be harrass'd, An unfeeling heart, and a front unembarrassed. Derry down, &c. "When from an old woman, by standing his ground, He had got the possession of ten thousand pound, He said that he cared not what others might call him, He would shew himself now the true son of Sir Balaam.* Derry down, &c." Keproaches or rebukes had little effect upon him, we are told, whether they came from friend or foe ; and, having once cast the die, he outdid every one in his barefaced dereliction of his former principles. " Young Balaam ne'er boggled at turning his coat, Determin'd to share in whate'er could be got ; Said, ' I scorn all those who cry, impudent fellow ! As my front is of brass, I'll be painted in yellow.'^ Derry down, &c, " Since yellow's the colour that best suits his face, Old Balaam aspires at an eminent place ; May he soon in Cheapside stand fix'd by the legs, His front well adorn'd and daub'd over with eggs. Derry down, &c.** Pitt's apostacy was celebrated in oth^r ballads equally bitter, and he was violently attacked in the opposition papers, especially in an evening paper entitled The National Journal, or Country Gazette, which was commenced on the 22rid of March, 1746, and the object of which seems to have been chiefly to expose the false and exaggerated information relating to the affairs of Scot- land published by the Government news-writers. The misuse of the Duchess of Marlborough's legacy, the " unembarrassed countenance" of the orator, (the term had been first applied to him in the House of Commons,) and a variety of other circum- stances, are dwelt upon with increasing banter by the writer of this journal, who makes a lengthened comparison of Orator Pitt with Orator Henley. But all was in vain : Pitt's eloquent " oratory" swayed the senate, ministerial bribes defeated oppo- sition without, and on the 1 2th of June the printer of The Na- tional Journal was thrown into Newgate, whence he escaped only upon the expiration of the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, in February, 1747. In the midst of the intrigues of the cabinet, the Prince of * An allusion to the character of Sir Balaam in Pope's Moral Essays, Epist. iii. 1. 339360. + A list of the names of those who voted for the Hanover troops two years before, which Pitt had then vehemently opposeil, and which he now as vehemently advocated, had been printed in yellow characters. 1 68 NEW OPPOSITION. Wales, dissatisfied with the ministry, in the formation of which he had had so large a share, and jealous of the popularity of his brother, again threw himself into the opposition. From this moment there was not only a sensible increase in the attacks against the Government, but every expedient was tried to blacken the character of the Duke of Cumberland. The cruelties exercised against the Scottish rebels were pressed on people's at- tention in every manner, and with every kind of exaggeration ; and the victor of Culloden became generally known by the epithet of " The Butcher." Even his fatness, and the lowness of some of his amours, were turned to derision. The caricature of "The agreeable Contrast," mentioned above as published after the battle of Culloden, was responded to by a parody entitled " The agreeable Contrast shews that a greyhound is more agreeable than an elephant, and a genteel person more agreeably pleasing than a clumsy one, a country lass better than a town trollop, and that Flora was better pleased than Fanny." The allusion is to the adventures of Flora Macdonald in aiding the escape of Prince Charles Edward, and to a woman of low origin, who had been taken into keeping by the Duke. An extraordi- THE BEAU. nary notion of the elegant figure and graceful manners of the Pretender was zealously spread abroad by the Jacobite emissaries, and in this caricature he is represented as the accom- plished beau, emblematically figured by his attendant, the courtly greyhound. He, too, is made to proclaim, " Mercy and love, peace," &c. ; while Flora exclaims, " Oh ! the agreeable creature I What a long tail he has I" On the other side of the picture THE BUTCHER. WESTMINSTER ELECTION stand the bloated " Butcher" and his attendant emblem, the elephant. The Duke is made to exclaim, " B d and w ds !" and a lady near him expresses strongly her dissatisfaction at his figure. All the political passions found a full vent in the general elections in 1747, which were unusually violent throughout the country ; and the ministers are understood to have attained their majo- rity only by the most lavish expenditure of the public money. At Westminster the two parties were brought into violent collision, and the Duke and the Prince of Wales are said to have taken an active part on the two sides. The Government candidates were Lord Trentham, the eldest son of Earl Gower, and Warren, who were elected by a considerable majority, against the opposition candidates, Phillips and Clarges. This party struggle was the subject of several spirited caricatures, in which the " Butcher" is made to cut a prominent figure. One of the best of these, pub- lished in June, 1747, bears the title of " The Two-shil- ling Butcher," and alludes to the open bribery carried forward on this occasion. It is described in an advertise- ment in the journals as " a curious parliamentary print." The Duke gravely observes, " My Lord, there being a fatality in the cattle, that there is 3000 above my cut, though I offered handsome." The individual thus ad- dressed, an elegantly dressed figure, intended apparently to represent Lord Trentham, THK TWQ-SHILLINQ BOTCHES. exclaims in reply, dissatisfied 170 FRENCH " STROLLERS." at the low price which the Duke had offered for votes, " Curse me ! you'd buy me the brutes at two shillings per head, bond fide." On one side of the print a person is seen picking Britan- nia's pocket, to give the money to Phillips and Clarges, while Britannia exclaims, "0 God! what pickpockets!" Among other caricatures on this election, one published in July bore the title, " The Humours of the Westminster Election ; or, the scald miserable independent electors in the suds." The agitation of a Westminster election was, however, soon to be renewed with still greater violence. In 1749, Lord Trentham having been appointed one of the Lords of the Admiralty, had to vacate his seat, and every exertion was made by the opposition to hinder his re-election. " Those who styled them- selves the independent electors of Westminster," says Smollett, " being now incensed to an uncommon degree of turbulence by the interposition of ministerial influence, determined to use their utmost endeavours to baffle the designs of the Court, and at the same time take vengeance on the family of Earl Gower, who had entirely abandoned the opposition, of which he was formerly one of the most respected leaders. With this view they held con- sultations, agreed to resolutions, and set up a private gentleman named Sir George Vandeput as the competitor of Lord Trentham, declaring that they would support his pretensions at their own expense ; being the more encouraged to this enterprise by the countenance and assistance of the Prince of Wales and his adhe- rents. They accordingly opened houses of entertainment for their partisans, solicited votes, circulated remonstrances, and propagated abuse : in a word, they canvassed with surprising spirit and perseverance against the whole interest of St. James's. Mobs were hired, and processions made on both sides, and the city of Westminster was filled with tumult and uproar." This election occurred in the midst of a violent popular anti- Gallican feeling, which had been shewn particularly against a company of French players who were performing at the Hay- market, and who were spoken of by the mob as the " French vagrants." An attempt had been made to binder them from acting, and they had been protected only by a mob hired by Lord Trentham, who appears to have affected Gallic manners, and to have been vain of his proficiency in the French language. The night after his ministerial appointment there was a great riot at the French theatre, in which Lord Trentham was accused of being personally active, although he denied it to the electors. This was made the most of by his opponents, who stigmatised him in ballads and squibs as "the champion of the French LORD TRENTHAM. 171 strollers;" and common people said that learning to talk French was only a step towards the introduction of French tyranny. In one of the ballads they said, " Our natives are starving, whom nature has made The brightest of wits, and to comedy bred ; Whilst apes are caress'd, whom God made by chance, The worst of all mortals, the strollers from France." Admiral Vernon, who took an earnest part in the opposition, said in a letter, which was printed and extensively circulated, " For the patrons of French strollers, a nation who are now undermining us in our commerce, and endeavouring to deprive us of it, I heartily detest them, as I think that every honest Briton should that wishes for the prosperity of his country." Lord Trentham's party retaliated by accusing Sir George Vandeput of being a Dutchman, and a partisan of the Dutch, who were at the moment not much more popular than the French ; and all the sins of that people, from the time of the massacre at Amboyna, were raked up and published. This West- minster election is said to have been one of the most expensive contests that the Government had as yet experienced. The fol- lowing epigram described a supposed conversation between Lord Trentham and his father : " Quoth L d G r [Lord Gower] to his son, ' Boy, thy frolic and place Full deep will be paid for by us and his g e [grace] : Ten thousand twice over advanced !' ' Veritable, Mon plre^ cry'd the youth ; ' but the D e [die] you know's able : Nor blame my French frolics ; since all men are certain, You're doing behind, what I did 'fore the curtain.' " An immense number of papers of different kinds, some of them in the highest degree scurrilous, were printed and circu- lated by both parties. The Ministers were accused of having set at liberty prisoners confined for small debts, that they might secure their votes ; numbers were brought to the place of polling on horseback, and every kind of dishonest trickery was practised on both sides. The same person was, in many cases, smuggled in to vote more than once, and such notices as the following were placarded on the walls : "This is to inform the publick, that there is now to be seen in Covent Garden the celebrated Mr. More, so well known to the curious for his astonishing variety of voices, who we hear intends to give them all in favour of Sir G. V 1." " This day ii publish' d, "An Essay on Multiplication, wherein it will be incontestably proved, that man, like those surprising creatures called Polypuses, may be cut into- i; WESTMINSTER ELECTIONEERING. 6, or 10, or more pieces, and each piece become a perfect animal ; as is exempfify'd in the case of several voters for the present W election, now living in the parishes of St. Clement's and St. Martin's le Grand." At the conclusion of the polling there appeared a majority for Lord Trentham, but his opponents demanded a scrutiny ; and this scrutiny proved so laborious and difficult, or the parties in- terested in opposing the Court threw so many obstacles in the way, that it led to a quarrel with the House of Commons, which Listed some months, and gave a double celebrity to the West- minster election of 1749. In spite, however, of the popular dissatisfaction without, which was thus from time to time exhibited in scenes of uproar and turbulence, the opposition in Parliament was weaker than it had ever been before, and its voice was still further silenced about this time by the admission of the Duke of Bedford into the administration. But, while thus enlarging itself by the ad- mission of not very accordant materials, a consequent division was gradually manifesting itself within the cabinet, which was soon formed into two distinct and rival parties, one represented by Mr. Pelham, the Duke of Bedford, and Fox, and the other by the Duke of Newcastle, who was jealous of his brother's talents and influence, and Pitt, who already looked forward to stepping over their quarrels to the summit of power. These discussions were gradually mixed up with the foreign transac- tions of the country, until they became in a manner identified with the two questions of peace and war. The war into which England had been hurried after the downfall of Sir Robert Walpole was carried on unskilfully, and had produced no advantages to this country, although the latter had been involved in an enormous expenditure. The rebellion in Scotland had been a most advantageous diversion for the enemy ; and at its close the French were capturing fortress after fortress in the Low Countries, until the fears and the turbulent dissatisfaction shewn by people throughout Holland obliged the Dutch to elect the Prince of Orange to the office of Stadtholder. The King of Prussia held aloof, attentive only to his private views of aggrandisement ; the movements of the Russians and Austrians were too slow to be effective ; and a number of petty allies were only enriching themselves with English subsidies. On the and of July, 1747, the allied army under the Duke of Cumberland was entirely defeated at the battle of Lauffeld, which spread a general feeling of discouragement. About the same time an English caricature, under the title of " Europe in Masquerade; or, the Royal farce," threw deserved ridicule on EUROPE IN MASQUERADE. 173 this war without principle, in which the peace and welfare of Europe were sacrificed to the intrigues of its cabinets. The fol- lowing lines, under the same title, were reprinted in the Found- ling Hospital of Wit, and describe with tolerable accuracy the state of politics in the latter part of 1747 : " The States, at last, with one accord, Have made themselves a sov'reign lord. For public good ? Be not mistaken, It was to save their own dear Bacon. The King most Christian does his work, By leaguing with the heathen Turk ; The haughty Turk and Kouli Khan Are friends or foes, as suits their plan ; The Russian lady plays her game, As fits her interest or fame. You've seen two curs for bone at bay, A third has run with it away ; Just so the Pr n [Prussian] silly watches, While others fight, the prey he snatches. At home behold a mighty pother, Friends worrying friends and brother brother, Pushing and elbowing one another. To Westminster but turn your eye, And the whole mystery you'll descry: The independents there you'll see Bawling aloud for liberty ; But if you follow in the dance, They'll lead you blind to Rome or France." The reverses of the allies on the Continent were, however, balanced by several decisive victories gained by the English at sea, which destroyed the commerce of France, and crippled her resources so much that the French monarch shewed a strong in- clination to treat for peace. The English prime minister was also desirous of a pacification ; but his brother, the Duke of New- castle, joined with the King and the Duke of Cumberland in wishing for a continuation of the war ; and it was not until many petty difficulties and obstacles had been overcome, that the congress at Aix-la-Chapelle was agreed upon. The negotia- tions were continued through the greater part of the year 1748, and the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle was not signed until the 7th of October. The English ministers were too much occupied with their own cabals and private interests to take care of the interests of their country, and her allies alone gained any advantages by the peace. The moment the preliminaries were announced, they be- came an object of attack, and the newspaper and pamphlet war- fare was carried on long after the war itself had ceased. That 174 PEACE OF AIX-LA-CHAPELLE. part of the treaty which caused the greatest discontent in this country was the stipulated restoration to France of Cape Breton, which had been taken by the English shortly before the breaking out of the Scottish rebellion ; and this discontent was very considerably heightened by the English government having submitted to the indignity of sending two noblemen, the Earl of Sussex and Lord Cathcart, to France as hostages until the restitution of this conquest should be completed. In the begin- ning of 1748 a loud cry was also set up against ministers, for allowing English bread to be exported to our enemies of France, who were suffering from famine, which was partly a consequence of the protracted hostilities. The popular arguments on this occasion may be summed up in an epigram printed in the General Advertiser of Feb. i : " To fast and pray, that heav'n our arms may bless, Is wise and pious we can do no less ; We might howe'er, methinks, something more do : ' What's that, pray ? ' Why, sir, make the French fast too." In the same journal, two days later, is advertised a caricature on the same subject, entitled " The Political Bitters ; a satirical print." Another subject of complaint, and a more reasonable one, was the practice of insuring French ships in England, so that this country was actually making good the losses which the French merchants sustained in the capture of their ships by the English cruizers. In May, 1748, appeared a caricature, en- titled " The Preliminary Congress," directed especially against the surrender of Cape Breton, and against the unsatisfactory conclusion of the sacrifices made by England, who is helping the empress queen over a stile, while France is seizing the oppor- tunity of her exposed position to take liberties with her person. ' A print published at the same time was entitled " The Congress of Beasts ; or, the milch cow." In another caricature, under nearly the same title, " The Congress of the Brutes at Aix-la- Chapelle," the different powers are represented under the forms of animals assembled in council, the Gallic cock presiding, to whom the British lion is, with all due humility, offering his recent conquest : " Pray accept Cape Breton !" In November, after the treaty was signed, appeared " The Grimier from Aix-l-a Chapelle ;" and in December appeared a number of spirited cari- catures on the subject of the hostages, under such titles as " The two most famous Ostriches ;" " The Hostages ; a political Print," &c. In one of these, entitled " The Wheelbarrow Crys of Eu- rope," the Earl of Sussex and Lord Cathcart are represented in a barrow wheeled by King George, who cries, " Hostages, ho ! THE HOSTAGES. 173 THE HOSTAGES. two a penny before they go !" And in another, dated December 8, Cromwell appears on the scene with furious threats, which he is only hindered from executing by the devil ; but he exclaims in his wrath, " Was it for this 1 sought the Lord and fought ?" In January, 1749, appeared " The Hostages ; an hero- ico-satirical poem ;" and at the end of the same month was advertised a pamphlet, (accompanied with a large caricature,) entitled " The Congress of the Beasts, under the mediation of the Goat, for nego- tiating a peace between the Fox, the Ass wearing a Lion's skin, the Tygress, the Horse, and other quadrupeds at war." At the same time appeared a number of pamphlets and ballads against the surrender of Gibraltar, which it was pretended that the English government contem- plated yielding up to Spain. In the British Magazine for January, 1 749, is announced " A humorous print, called the Peace-o'ffering." Yet, in spite of these marks of dissatisfaction at the terms of the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, peace under any form appears to have been acceptable, and it was followed by general demonstra- tions of joy. The fireworks in the Green Park were unusually magnificent, and these and the jubilee masquerade at Ranelagh were represented in multitudes of prints, which were eagerly bought by the multitude. In one of these prints the fireworks are satirically called " the grand whim for posterity to laugh at." The Dutch, who had been reduced to a far worse position than the other allies, and who were now almost destitute of money and resources, rejoiced louder than anybody else, and their fireworks far exceeded those of the Green Park in magnifi- cence. The British public thought that Holland had been too much favoured in the treaty, and that power was suspected of having had the intention of treating in private for its own inte- rests. These extravagant demonstrations of joy by the Dutch were accordingly caricatured somewhat ungenerously in an Eng- lish print, entitled " The Contrast," in which the prosperity of England (for England had really been increasing rapidly in commercial importance and wealth) is represented under 176 PUBLIC REJOICINGS FOR THE PEACE. the form of a portly individual, with his pockets full of money, laughing at the miserable figure of a Dutchman with his empty pockets turned out. The inscription under the Englishman is, " Money with Commerce;" that under the Dutchman, " No money with fireworks !"* In the midst of these po- pular subjects of discontent, the divisions in the ministry were becoming every day more apparent, and the open accession of the Prince of Wales raised again the spirits of the parliamentary opposi- tion. The old intriguer Bo- lingbroke was again brought into play, and new plots were constantly hatching, either at his house at Battersea or at the Prince's at Leicester House. It was not long before the ministry was weakened by several defections ; Bubb Dodington first relinquished his place of treasurer of the navy, and returned to a post he had formerly held in the Prince of Wales's household, and he took the lead in the Prince's party. A regular opposition was now again organised in the House of Commons, and the printed attacks on measures and persons became more energetic, as well as more numerous. One of the most violent of these, published under the title of " Constitutional Queries," was levelled at the Duke of Cumberland, who was compared in it to the " crook- backed" Richard III., and it was generally supposed to have come from Leicester House, and to have been written by Lord Egmont. These " Queries" raised a violent heat in the two Houses; the open attempt to sow dissension between the two royal brothers was strongly animadverted upon, and the paper in question was ordered to be burnt by the common hangman, * In the British Magazine for May, 1749, a caricature is announced under the title, "The Contrast ; or, such is the folly of no money with fire- works, or money with commerce." I am uncertain if this be the same print as the one described above, or (as was not unusual) a different edition of it. PEACE AND PT.EXTT. DEATH OF THE PRINCE OF WALES. 177 and measures were taken, but in vain, to discover and punish the author. But the Prince's party in the House opposed these proceedings, and Sir Francis Dashwood and others spoke in pal- liation of the libel. These party intrigues occupied the whole of the year 1750, and were proceeding with increased activity in the beginning of 1751, when the opposition received a sudden blow from an event totally unexpected. On the 5th of February, 1751, appeared the royal proclamation of a reward of a thousand pounds for the discovery of the author of the " Constitutional Queries." The Prince of Wales died suddenly on the 2oth of March, after a short illness, and relieved his father's ministry from one of its most dangerous opponents. For several years after the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, the pub- lication of political caricatures seemed almost suspended, and we shall find them of comparatively rare occurrence till the breaking out of the war in 1755. In the October of 1749 appeared " The true Contrast between a Royal British Hero and a frighted Italian Bravo," occasioned by the movements of the Pretender on the Continent, (who was shut out from France and Spain by the treaty of peace,) and shewing that his name still excited some interest in England ; and " The Laugh ; or, Bub's compli- ments to Ralpho," alluding, probably, to some circumstance in the opposition movements, of which Dodington was so active a promoter. The opposition sustained a further loss in Lord Bolingbroke, who died on the ij>th of December. The old actors, who had played their parts under George I., were rapidly disappearing from the stage, and we are entering upon the politics of an en- tirely new generation. i 7 8 CHAPTER VI. GEOEGE II. Changes in the Administration, and Incipient Opposition Old Interest and New Interest Elizabeth Canning The Bill for the Naturalization of the Jews Elections ; Hogarth's Prints Death of Mr. Pelham, and Consequent Changes in the Ministry War with France Trial of Admiral Byng New Convulsion in the Ministry, and Accession of William Pitt to Power The Seven Years' War Popular Discontent ; Beer versus Gin Conquest of Canada Death of George the Second. THE incipient opposition at Leicester House, as we have just seen, was overthrown by the death of the Prince of Wales ; and its ostensible leader, Bubb Dodington, and others, tried to sell themselves at the highest price they could to the people in power. All the great political questions which had so long agitated the country seemed, indeed, now to have become ex- tinguished, and to have given place to a far less honourable partisanship of private jealousies and private interests, in which it was the object of the minister to strengthen himself, by giving place to as many individuals as he had any reason to fear in the opposition, and the simple and only object of opposition was to establish a claim for admission to place. This was so univer- sally felt, that, instead of the old distinctions of Whig and Tory, Hanoverian and Jacobite, or Court Party and Country Party, the supporters of ministers and the opposition had almost in- voluntarily taken the distinctive titles of the New Interest and the Old Interest ; the New Interest being that of men in place, the Old Interest that of men who wanted to be in place. The parliamentary opposition, however, raised its head a little in the June of 1751, upon the dismissal of Lord Sandwich, and the consequent resignation of the Duke of Bedford and Lord Trent- ham. Lord Granville was again admitted into the ministry as one of the secretaries of state, and Anson was placed at the Board of Admiralty. The year 1751 passed off with great quietness ; and the only remarkable parliamentary act in the portion of the session which closed it was the alteration of style, by correcting the calendar according to the Gregorian computation, then adopted by most other nations in Europe, it being decreed that the new vear should begin in future on the ALTERATION OF THE STYLE. 179 ist day of January, and that eleven intermediate nominal days, between the 2nd and I4tli days of September, 1752, should lor that time be omitted ; so that the day succeeding the 2nd should then be denominated the i4th of that month. An alteration so useful in every point of view did not pass without some show of discontent ; it was declaimed against as a Popish innovation, and long afterwards many people adhered tenaciously to the old practice. In 1752, the opposition, though weak, shewed more signs of life. At the end of January, the Duke of Bedford attacked the subsidiary treaty with Saxony, by which the elector was bribed to give his vote for the Archduke Joseph as King of the Romans, the question which was now agitating Germany, and which paved the way for the celebrated Seven years' war. The Pel hams, alarmed, now tried to buy over Bubb Dodington ; but the nego- tiation again failed, and the opposition became a little more spirited, and it shewed itself much stronger on two bills for the naturalization of Jews, and the regulation of marriages. Fox gave violent offence to the Lord Chancellor Hardwicke by his conduct in opposing this latter bill, which, to use the words of Horace Walpole, was " invented by my Lord Bath, and cooked up by the chancellor." It may be observed, en passant, that, on the 4th of February, 1752, died Sir John Hynde Cotton, the last of the English Jacobites who had displayed any activity. In the midst of this political calm, the newspapers and politi- cal essayists, which had increased in number, were obliged to seek matter for agitation in the passing incidents of the day ; and these shew us how easy it was, in the last century, to set the passions of the multitude in a flame. A young woman of respectable connexions, named Mary Blandy, was executed at Oxford, in the beginning of 17.53, for poisoning her father, and her crime had been attended with remarkable and somewhat romantic circumstances. She persisted at the scaffold in assert- ing her innocence ; a number of pamphlets were published by persons who took part for or against her, and it became the subject of a warm public dispute. This was soon followed by a still more singular affair. A girl named Elizabeth Canning, who lived with her mother at Aldermanbury. in London, de- clared that on the night of the ist of January, 1753, two ruf- fians seized on her as she was passing under Bedlam wall, stripped her of her outer apparel, secured her mouth with a gag, and conveyed her on foot about ten miles, to a place called Enfield Wash, where they brought her to the house of one Mrs. Wells, where she was robbed of her stays, and, because she i8o ELIZABETH CANNING. refused to become a prostitute, confined in a cold and unfurnished apartment, where she remained a whole month, without any other food than a few stale crusts of bread and a gallon of water, till at last she forced her way through a window, and ran home, almost naked, to her mother's house, in the night of the 2pth of January. The story was an improbable one ; but, perhaps, on this very account it gained more popularity, and money was subscribed to prosecute the persons concerned in the outrage. Of three persons charged, Wells (the mistress of the house) was punished as a bawd ; her servant, Virtue Hall, turned evidence for Canning to save herself, but afterwards recanted ; and an old gipsy woman, named Squires, was convicted of the robbery of the stays, though she produced undeniable evidence that, at the time the offence was said to have taken place, she was at Abbotsbury, in Dorsetshire. At the trial, the court was surrounded by an enraged mob, which threatened with the utmost violence all who were brought as evidence for the ac- cused, or who did not sympathize with Canning. The Lord Mayor, Sir Crispe Gascoigne, made a clear and impartial state- ment of the case ; and at his representation the gipsy woman, Squires, received the royal pardon. This only added fuel to the popular fury. Some of the leading journals had taken up Can- ning's cause with considerable warmth, and they now turned their resentment against the Lord Mayor. An incredible num- ber of pamphlets, both serious and satirical, on both sides of the question, with many prints and caricatures, issued from the press ; and the faction raised throughout the kingdom on this trifling subject was so great, that, to use the words of a contem- porary writer, " it became the general topic of conversation in all assemblies, and people of all ranks espoused one or other party, with as much warmth and animosity as had ever in- flamed the Whigs and Tories, even at the most rancorous period of their opposition." Prosecutions for perjury were commenced on both sides ; and, in the end, after Virtue Hall's recantation, Canning herself confessed that the whole story was a fabrica- tion, and she was condemned to transportation. But her sup- porters, even now, did not give up her cause ; those who were least zealous asserted that she had not acted voluntarily, but that she had been the tool of others ; and they subscribed money for her, provided her with every comfort on her voyage, and en- sured, her a good reception in America. People's minds were drawn off" from this affair by a new sub- ject of political agitation. The act of parliament of 1752, to permit the naturalization of foreign Jews, which was the work THE JEW BILL. j8i of the Pelhams, had not passed without a violent opposition in the House of Commons ; and, although the bishops had offered no opposition to it in the House of Lords, the clergy out of doors raised such a general outcry, as reminded people of the High-Church agitation of the days of Sacheverell. The alarm of the Church party had been further excited by the deistical tendency of the posthumous works of Lord Bolingbroke, whom while alive they had almost sanctified as their political cham- pion. The merchants of London began also to be alarmed at imaginary commercial advantages which the Jews were to de- rive from the measure. As the period for the general elections was now fast approaching, the excitement increased tenfold. Multitudes of controversial tracts were published on this sub- ject, as well as others, the more immediate design of which was to inflame the passions of the mob. Among these were his- tories of the Jews, written in a partial spirit, and magnifying their pretended sins : fearful prognostications of their increasing power, and of their encroachment on the liberties and on the commercial power of the country ; and strange imaginary pic- tures of the state of the country under Jewish supremacy, when it was supposed that the Jews would gradually have made themselves masters of the estates and property of the English nobility and gentry. Caricatures against the Jews were exhibited in the windows of the print-shops, and ballade equally bitter were sung about the streets. Thus, in August, 1753, a caricature is advertised under the title of "The Cii-cum- cis'd Gentiles ; or, a Journey to Jerusalem," stated to be " en- graved by Issachar Barebone, Juu r ;" and in December another caricature was announced, entitled " The Racers Unhors'd ; or, the Jews jockey'd." One of the ballads, entitled " The Jew's Triumph," and set" to a popular tune, gives a melancholy ac- count of the disasters of the year : " In seventeen hundred and fifty-three, The style it was changed to P p ry [Popery 1, But that it is lik'd, we don't all agree ; Which nobody can deny. " When the country folk first heard of this act, That old father Style was condemned to be i :.ckM, And robb'd of his time, which appears to be fact, Which nobody can deny ; " It puzzl'd their brains, their senses perplex'd, And all the old ladies were very much vex'<), Not dreaming that Levites would alter our text ; Which nobody can deny." The faults of the Jews, and the dangers to be apprehended i8a THE ELECTIONS. from them, are portrayed in equally doggerel verses, and ven- geance is finally called down upon those who had now advocated their cause. " But 'tis hoped that a mark will be set upon those Who were friends to the Jews, and Christians' foes, That the nation may see how Deism grows ; Which nobody can deny. " Then cheer up your spirits, let Jacobites swing,* And Jews in their bell-ropes hang when they ring To our sovereign lord great George our king ; Which nobody can deny." " The Jews naturalized ; or, the English alienated : a ballad :" breathes the game spirit, and ascribes the passing of the Natura- lization Act to that extensive system of bribery with which everybody was then familiar. Even the clergy preached against the Jew bill from the pulpit ; and the ministry became so alarmed for the elections, that they weakly yielded to the foolish clamour, and repealed their own act at the commencement of the session at the end of 1753. The elections, which took place in the April following (1754), were less clamorous than it was expected, and, with the excep- tion of a violent contest in Oxfordshire, the opposition the court had to contend with was not great. The chief party-cries re- lated to the Jews, to the alteration in the style, and to the Marriage Act.f The new Parliament, to use the words of Horace Walpole, was selected " in the very spirit of the Pel- hams." The revival of the opposition in Parliament, and the agitation naturally attendant on elections under such circum- stances, produced a few caricatures, which possessed little merit. In February was announced " The P. [Parliament /] Race ; or the C. [court~\ jockeys." We are better acquainted with a cari- cature published on the nth of June, under the title of " Foreign Trade and Domestic compared ;" in which one of two compartments represents the King of France raising up French commerce upon the ruins of that of Great Britain ; while, in the other compartment, the Duke of Newcastle, as minister, is * Alluding to the execution of Dr. Cameron this year, which had excited compassion rather than exultation, even among a mob which appears to Lave b. .ts, washes them, and icturns them to their place without the person suffering the least hurt. 3rd. He opens the head of a J of P [justice of peace"], takes out Lis brains, and exchanges them for those of a call ; the brains of a beau, for those of an ass ; and the heart of a bully, for that of a sheep ; which operations render the person more sociable and rational creatures than they ever were in their lives. " An.l to convince the town that no imposition is intended, he desires no money until the performance is over. "Boxes, 5 gu. Pit, 3. Gal., 2. N.B. The famous oculist will be there, and honest S F .* * This probably means Samuel Foote. The next initial perhaps refers to Dr. Hill. The oculist was a noted quack of the tune, and the orator was of EARTHQUAKES IN LONDON. 233 H will come if he can. Ladies may come masked, so may fribbles. The faculty and clergy gratis. The Orator would be there, but is engaged." "The Man in the Bottle" became immediately the hero of several satirical pamphlets on the folly and credulity of the age, besides making his appearance in ballads and caricatures. Two of the caricatures, published in the course of January, were entitled " The Bottle-Conjuror from Head to Foot, without equivoca' tion," and " English Credulity ; or, ye 're all bottled." In the latter Folly is leading by a string to the bottle-conjuror's table, a group of characters distinguished in arms, law, physic, &c. A sword, alluding to the Duke of Cumberland's loss, is flying away, and a fiend is in pursuit for the proffered reward of thirty guineas. Britannia turns away her face in shame " Oh ! my sons !" In another print, as a companion to the Bottle, harle- quin is represented in a very ingenious manner, jumping down his own throat. On the 26th of January, and for some time after, the play-bills added to the announcement of the pantomime of Apollo and Daphne, " In which will be introduced a new scene of the escape of harlequin into a quart-bottle ;" and in the summer, a new comedy, called " The Magician ; or, the bottle- conjuror," was acted at the smaller theatres. For many years afterwards the bottle-conjuror was a standing joke upon English folly. Yet, within a year, the credulity of our countrymen was again exhibited in a still more extraordinary occurrence. Several smart shocks of earthquakes were felt throughout England about the middle of the last century. The beginning of the year 1750 had been unusually stormy and tempestuous. On the 8th of February, the inhabitants of London were alarmed by a rumbling noise, and a shock, which shook all the houses with such violence that the house-bells rang, and the furniture and utensils were moved from their places. On the same day of the next month a second shock was felt, between the hours of five and six in the morning, which was considerably more intense than the former, and caused the greater consternation, because it awoke people from their sleep. Smollett, who was present in London at the time, tells us that it was preceded by a succession of thick, low flashes of lightning, and a rumbling noise like that of a heavy carriage rolling over a hollow pavement. " The shock itself," he says, " consisted of repeated vibrations, which lasted some course Henley. It is a satire on the different sorts of quackery then pre- valent. During this year the quacks were brought on the Ktage in several farces, such as "The Muck Doctor," at Covent Garden, "The Anatomist, or the Sham Doctor." 434 THE EARTHQUAKE PANIC. seconds, and violently shook every house from top to bottom. Many persons started from their beds, and ran to their doors and windows in dismay." The alarm occasioned by these two earthquakes was seized upon by the religious enthusiasts of the day as an opportunity for admonishing their fellow-countrymen against the immorality and profaneness which then so widely pervaded English society, and they hesitated not to declare that the earthquakes had been sent as special marks of the displeasure of heaven against the prevailing sins of the people. The Church, in some degree, caught up the same cry, and a pastoral letter of the Bishop of London became the subject of severe strictures. Books on earthquakes and their effects were bought up with great eagerness, and issued from the press with equal rapidity ; and people began to look forward with apprehension to the probability of a third shock, which might be still more severe. These apprehensions were gaining ground towards the end of March, when a soldier of the life-guards, who had been driven mad by attending the preaching of religious enthusiasts, ran about the town, crying out that on the same day four weeks after the last shock (which would be Thursday, the ^th of April) another earthquake, of a much more formidable character, would swallow up the whole metropolis and destroy its inhabitants, as a punishment for their sins ; and that Westminster Abbey would be buried in the ruins, and disappear for ever. The prophet was arrested, and placed in a mad-house, but this did not calm the fears of the multitude, which increased as the fatal day ap- proached ; and even many of those who had at first combated these ridiculous fears, began insensibly to imbibe the contagion. The popular credulity was so great, that on the ist of April eome hundreds of people went through a heavy rain to Edmon- ton, upon the report that a hen had laid an egg there the day before, on which was inscribed in large capital letters the words " eware of the third shock /" During the following days, many people, who possessed the means of absenting themselves,- left London under different excuses, and repaired to various parts of the kingdom. Read's Weekly Journal of the 7th of April informs us, that " Thirty coaches, filled with genteel- looking people, were, at Wednesday noon, at Slough, running away from the prognosticated earthquake;" and adds, "and it is known that 34 P s, 94 C rs, and two P ds of , fled to different parts of the kingdom this week on the same account, in order to avoid the vengeance denounced against them by a late pastoral letter." All the roads leading from London to the country were thronged ; and in the course of THE EARTHQUAKE PANIC. 235 Wednesday afternoon, whole families locked up their houses, and went into the open fields outside the metropolis, which were filled with an incredible number of people, assembled in chairs and carriages as well as on foot, who waited in trembling suspense until the return of day convinced most of them of the groundlessness of their apprehensions. Many, however, still insisted that it was a mistake in the day, and that the earthquake would occur on Sunday the 8th, as they should have counted the day of the month, and not that of the week. The ridicule thrown upon this affair, after the day was past, was as great as the apprehensions which had preceded it. In the account given in the Universal Magazine, we are told, " It is observed by the hackney-coachmen and chairmen, that none of the great folks went out of town to avoid the fulfilling of the madman's prophecy about the earthquakes, but such whose curiosity led them to see the conjuror creep into the glass bottle." Lists of the " nobility, gentry, and others," who had fled from the town, were printed and handed about ; and sati- rical tracts were published under such titles as " A full and true Account of the dreadful and melancholy Earthquake," which were so arranged as to furnish a meal of political and private scandal to those who loved to fatten on such food. Other pamphlets dwelt more seriously on the impiety of setting up to be interpreters of the inscrutable designs of Providence. In the course of the month of April this event produced two carica- tures, the first entitled " The Military Prophet ; or, a flight from Providence ;" the other, " The Panick ; or, the force of frighted imagination." For twelve years, English credulity was allowed to spend itself in trifling ebullitions, and it offers little to arrest our at- tention. But at the end of that period, an affair more ridiculous, if possible, than any of the preceding, agitated the public ; it had had its conjuror and its earthquake the new subject of at- traction was a ghost. The fame of the Cock Lane ghost has in some sort outlived the memory of bottle-conjuror or military prophet. A Mr. Kent, who lived with the sister of his deceased wife, had occupied lodgings in Cock Lane, Smithfield, at the house of a Mr. Parsons, but, having quarrelled with his land- lord, he removed to a house in Clerkenwell, where his com- panion, who is known in the story by the name of Miss Fanny, died of the small-pox. Parsons, to revenge himself upon Mr. Kent, declared that the ghost of Miss Fanny haunted the room of his daughter, (with whom she had slept during Kent's ab- sence from town,) and had charged Kent with having poisoned 23 <5 THE STAGE: GARRICK. her. On examination, mysterious knockings and scratching^ were heard at night about the girl's bed ; and the report being spread abroad by papers and pamphlets, a concourse of people, many of them of the highest rank and character, visited the house during successive nights ; the surrounding streets were filled with mobs, and an extraordinary sensation was created throughout London. Suspicions of trickery, however, soon arose among the more sensible part of the visitors ; the child was removed to another house, and separated from her friends, when the result was unsatisfactory, and the ghost failed in its promise to signify its presence in the vault where Miss Fanny was buried, which had been visited by a select party. After this, the child was detected, and made a confession, and all the persons concerned in the imposture were prosecuted and severely punished. The details of this affair, which occurred in the be- ginning of the year 1762, are too ridiculous to deserve repeating ; it gave rise to a number of pamphlets ; made ghost stories popu- lar throughout the country for several months, and brought them on the stage ; and produced the long rambling satirical poem of " The Ghost" from the pen of Churchill. The stage was exciting public attention in an unusual degree for some years, at the middle of the last century, from a variety of circumstances ; and the moral tendency of the stage itself, the policy of its advocates, the characters of the performers, their personal disputes, and the rivalry of different companies, afforded matter for a continual issue of pamphlets in prose and verse, and a few prints and caricatures. The general character of the performances differed little since the reign of George I. ; for pantomimes and burlesques had established themselves per- manently in popular favour, and they now went on hand in hand with the regular drama. Amid the rivalries alluded to, and supported by some of the best actors who have ever trod the English stage, the plays of the great English bard were gaining daily in popularity. It has already been noticed, that, besides the licensed theatres, there was a theatre far east in Goodman's Fields, where a com- pany of players had long been allowed by forbearance to act, be- cause it was thought probably that they did not much affect the audiences of the houses at the West End. It was here that amateurs sometimes gratified their vanity without risk, and it served also as a sort of school for many who afterwards figured on the boards of Drury Lane and Coveut Garden. It was at this theatre, that, on the ipth of October, 1741, David Garrick first made his appearance on a London stage ; and, in the cha- THEATRICAL CONTENTIONS, 237 racter of Richard the Third, he gained such universal admira- tion, that within a few days the larger theatres were almost deserted, and Goodman's Fields presented the unusual spectacle of crowds of carriages from St. James's and Grosvenor Square. Quin, who had been engaged at Drury Lane, had hitherto been considered as the first tragic actor on the English stage, anil, alarmed at Garrick's success, he did all in his power to cry him down, but in vain. The patentees of the two great theatres were still more alarmed at the deficiency of their receipts, and they prepared at last to take those measures against the unli- censed theatre of the east end, that forced the latter into a com- position, which ended, some months after, in Garrick's final removal to Drury Lane. About the same time, Quin went over to Covent Garden, to oppose Garrick, his jealousy of whom con- tinued unabated. The patent of Drury Lane was at this time in the hands of Charles Fleetwood, who had bought it at a mo- ment when the mismanagement of the former proprietors had reduced it to a very low state, and driven away the best per- formers. The latter had opened the little theatre in the Hay- market, with some success, but they returned to Drury Lane under Fleetwood, and left their theatre in the Haymarket to a company of French actors. Fleetwood was a man utterly devoid of dramatic taste, and, to the disgust of Garrick, he had brought the tumblers and rope-dancers of Sadler's Wells on the boards of Drury. Other ill-conduct on the part of Fleetwood drove the Drury Lane company to a new revolt ; they seceded from the theatre under Garrick and Macklin, and tried to obtain a new patent from the Lord Chamberlain, but in vain. The con- sequence was, that they were obliged to come to terms with Fleetwood, in which Macklin was made a sacrifice, and quar- relled with Garrick for deserting him. The town took part with Macklin ; and when Drury Lane re-opened towards the end of 174,3, the theatre presented, for two or three nights, a scene of violent uproar between the partisans of the two actors, which threatened, at one moment, to put a stop to Garrick's acting. Garrick. spent the year 1745, and part of 1746, in Dublin, from whence he returned in the May of the latter year, and engaged himself at Covent Garden, under Rich. Fleetwood had, meanwhile, sold his interest in Drury Lane, and it was now under the management of Lacy, who had a good share in the proprietorship. In 1747 began the great rivalry between the two large theatres, under Rich and Lacy, which agitated the theatrical world for some ensuing years. Rich, much against his will, had 238 ROMEO AND JULIET. made a momentary sacrifice of his passion for pantomime, in favour of the regular drama, and engaged Garrick, Quin, Wood- ward, Mrs. Gibber, Mrs. Pritchard, and several other good actors. The Drury Lane company numbered among its c^iief performers, Barry and Macklin, Yates, Mrs. Clive, and Peg Woffington. It was the first time that Garrick and Quin had played together, and the superiority of the former was soon ac- knowledged, to the great mortification and discontent of his rival. Yet, in spite of the superiority which the great actor had given Covent Garden over the rival theatre, Rich was weak enough to treat him with neglect ; and Mr. Lacy having ob- tained a new patent for Drury Lane, ceded one half of it to Garrick, who thus, in the summer of 1747, became joint pro- prietor and stage-manager of Drury Lane theatre. Mrs. Pritchard, Mrs. Gibber, and others, followed Garrick to Drury Lane, which was opened with great eclat on the aoth of Sep- tember, 1747 ; and the following season witnessed a complete revival of Shakspeare and the older dramatists on the stage. Jealousies and frequent quarrels, however, soon broke out in Garrick's company, which furnished materials for the carica- turist during the season of 1 748, and the consequence of which was the desertion of Barry and Mrs. Gibber to Covent Garden in 1749, where they joined with Quin and Mrs. Woffington, and thus formed under Rich a dangerous rivalry to the other theatre. In October, 1749, the Covent Garden company opened the theatrical campaign with " Romeo and Juliet," a play in which Barry, and especially Mrs. Gibber, had shone with peculiar excellence. Garrick had armed himself for the contest ; he had prepared a rival actress in Miss Bellamy, and he produced, to the surprise of his opponents, the same play of " Romeo and Juliet" at Drury Lane, ou the very night it came out at Covent Garden. It was a repetition of the war of rival harlequins in the preceding reign. The town was divided for a long time be- tween the two " Romeo and Juliets," which produced a mass of contradictory criticism, and finished by almost emptying both houses, for everybody began to be tired of the monotonous repe- tition of the same play. A popular epigram of the day spoke distinctly the public feeling " On the Run of ' Romeo and Juliet.' " ' Well, what's to night ? ' says angry Ned, As up from bed he rouses ; ' Romeo again ! ' and shakes his head, ' Ah ! plague on both your houses ! ' " Personal jealousies, not only among the actors themselves, ANTI-GALLICISM. 239 but between them and their manager Rich, soon broke up the harmony of the Covent Garden company. Garrick retaliated on their efforts to outshine him by attacking Rich in his own pecu- liar walk ; and at the beginning of 1750 brought out a new pan- tomime, entitled " Queen Mab," in which Woodward acted the part of harlequin. The great success of this piece, which brought crowded houses for forty nights without intermission, gave rise to a very popular caricature, entitled " The Theatrical Steelyard," in which Mrs. Gibber, Mrs. Woffington, Quin, and Barry, are outweighed by Woodward's harlequin and Garrick's Queen Mab. Rich, dressed in the garb of harlequin, lies on the ground ex- AN EXPIRING HARLEQUIN. piring. The rivalry of the two theatres continued in this state in the year 1752, in the literary warfare of which period we have seen them so deeply involved. Garrick's backwardness in bringing out new plays had embroiled him with several of the critics of the day. But, in the middle of his success, an untoward accident came to disturb the triumphs of the English Roscius. The popular feeling against the employment of French actors, which had been shewn so remarkably in the Westminster election of 1 749, was now at its height, having been kept up by several squibs and caricatures. One of the latter, published in 1750, under the title of " Britannia disturb'd ; or, an invasion by French vagrants," represents the foreigners forced on Britannia by a band of aristocratic rioters, while she holds in her lap her fa- vourite English players and pantomimists. In 1754, with the hope of raising still higher the theatrical pre-eminence of Drury Lane, Garrick first planned his grand spectacle, brought out in the beginning of November, 1755, under the title of "The Chinese Festival." It had been found necessary to employ a great number of French dancers in this spectacle, the report of 240 THE ROSCIAD. which having gone abroad, while the hatred of the French \vas increased by the breaking out of hostilities and by their conduct in America, a mob assembled in the theatre or, the first night with the determination of putting a stop to the performance. Garrick, who had expended a large sum of money on this enter- tainment, did his utmost, but in vain, to appease the ill-humour ; but the fashionable people in the boxes took his part, and the war between the two parties continued with doubtful success during five nights. The sixth night of representation was an opera night, and the strength of the boxes was weakened by the absence of many people of quality. When the riot began several gentlemen of rank jumped from the boxes into the pit, and at- tempted to seize the ringleaders, and the ladies, who remained in the boxes, pointed out to them the obnoxious persons ; but after a long and rude contest, in which some blood was drawn, the united pit and galleries triumphed, and they now wreaked their vengeance on the materials of the theatre, demolished the scenes, tore up the benches, broke the lustres, and soon effected a damage which it required several thousand pounds to repair. The young writers who had formerly found a great part of their employment in writing new pieces for the stage, became more and more irritated at the dramatic taste which deprived them of a part of their bread, by raising up Shakspeare and the older drama, and, being mostly connected with the different papers, magazines, and reviews of the day, they took their re- venge by severe and often unfair criticisms on the different performers, which made them objects of dread among the players. The natural consequence of this was, that the stage attracted more and more the attention of the literary world, until, in the March of 1761, the first, and one of the most remarkable poems of one of the most remarkable poets of that day, the " Rosciad" of Charles Churchill, stole anonymously into the world. In this poem, distinguished by remarkable vigour of design and execu- tion, the poet introduces the actors of the day contending for the throne of Iloscius, and he satirises with great critical seve- rity the individual defects of the players, as well as those of the writers for the stage. Garrick, whose claim is allowed as the successor of Roscius, was the only one who escaped his lash. This poem, to which the author affixed his name in a second edition, met at once with the most extraordinary success, and passed quickly through a great number of editions, although it was bitterly attacked by the critics, not only in the reviews, but in an incredible number of pamphlets, under every form that the provoked anger of the disputants could imagine. These are too CHURCHILL AND THE REVIEWERS. 241 obscure and too dull to merit even that their titles should be enumerated. But Churchill was stung to the quick, and in another poem, under the title of the " Apology," he attacked with extreme bitterness the reviewers and the stage in general, to which he attributed the shoal of abusive pamphlets that had been showered upon him for his theatrical criticisms He stig- matises the critics as an upstart brood of literary assassins, who from their dark concealment stabbed at unprotected genius, when it had with difficulty escaped from the coldness of the great and the persecutions of bigotry : " Unhappy Genius ! placed by partial Fate With a free spirit in a slavish state, Where the reluctant Muse, oppressed by kings, Or droops in silence, or in fetters sings. In vain thy dauntless fortitude hath borne The bigot's furious zeal and tyrant's scorn. Why didst thou safe from home-bred dangers steer, Reserved to perish more ignobly here ? " Thus when, the Julian tyrant's pride to swell, Rome with her Pompey at Pharsalia fell, The vanquished chief escaped from Caesar's hand, To die by ruffians in a foreign land." The extraordinary power which the critics, though self- elected, had now usurped, is next glanced at : " How could these self-elected monarchs raise So large an empire on so small a base ? In what retreat, inglorious and unknown, Did Genius sleep when Dulness seized the throne T Whence, absolute now grown, and free from awe, She to the subject world dispenses law. Without her licence not a letter stirs, And all the captive criss-cross-row is hers." He next attacks the reviewers for dragging people's names from intentional concealment, whilst they remain themselves carefully screened from view : they had, in fact, attacked several persons by name, as the authors of the " Rosciad," before Churchill had affixed his own to it. This seems at first to have been the great complaint of the authors against the reviewers ; for, while they did not flinch from the old wars of pamphlets, they objected to being regularly brought for judgment by a hid- den and irresponsible conclave, who were not accessible to re- taliation. " Founded on arts which shun the face of day, By the same arts they still maintain their sway. Wrapped in mysterious secrecy they rise, And, as they are unknown, are safe and wise. B 4 CHURCHILL AND THE ACTORS. At whomsoever aim'd, howe'er severe, The envenom'd slander flies, no names appear : Prudence forbid that step : then all might know And on more equal terms engage the foe. But now, what Quixote of the age would care To wage a war with dirt, and fight with air f ' The poet then turns with increased rage upon the actors, whom he accuses of having a troop of mercenary writers in their pay to cry up their deserts, and of wishing thus to impose upon the taste and judgment of the public : " Doth it more move our anger or our mirth, To see these things, the lowest sons of earth, Presume, with self-sufficient knowledge graced, To rule in letters and preside in taste ? The town's decisions they no more admit, Themselves alone the arbiters of wit, And scorn the jurisdiction of that court To which they owe their being and support. Actors, like monks of old, now sacred grown, Must be attack' d by no fools but their own." The lighter amusements of the town had not lost their popu- larity amid what certainly must be looked upon as the regenera- tion of the legitimate drama ; and, in spite of the severe attacks of the moralists, with which they had been assailed at their first introduction into this country, masquerades or ridottos long con- tinued to sustain their ground. In the summer of 1730, a day masquerade in the open air was introduced as a novelty at Vaux- hall, under the name of a ridotto alfresco, and, although it pro- voked new outcries against the immoral tendency of this sort of entertainment, it was for a time extremely popular, and made considerable noise. On the first day (Wednesday, the yth of June) there were about four hundred persons in masquerade dresses, and it was announced in the newspapers that one of them had his pocket picked of fifty guineas. The taste for ridottos alfresco seems soon to have subsided ; and indeed night was best calculated for the multitude of intrigues that were con- stantly carried on at these assemblies. It is impossible to enter into the history of fashionable society at this period, without perceiving the injurious effects of the passion for masquerades on the public morals. To keep outward decorum, it was necessary to announce in the advertisements and bills that guards were stationed in the rooms to prevent any offensive conduct. A few years later, the indignation of the moralist was again excited by the report that ladies were in the habit of frequenting the mas- querades in men's clothing ; and even greater improprieties than MASQUERADES AND RIDOTTOS. 243 this appear to have been at times perpetrated. The satirical Drury Lane Journal, of April 9, 1752, contains the following burlesque announcement : ' ' ADVERTISEMENT. " Whereas there will be a very splendid appearance at Ranelagh Jubilee, C. Richman takes leave to inform the nobility, and no others, that he can furnish them with " New-invented masks for those who are ashamed of their own faces, or have no face at all. " Naked dresses, in imitation of their own skin, " And all other natural disguises." Only three years previously to this announcement, in 1 749, one of the Princess of Wales's maids of honour, Elizabeth Chud- leigh, afterwards the notorious Duchess of Kingston, had carried the second of these ideas into actual practice, by appearing at a masquerade given by the Venetian ambassador at Somerset House, in the character of Iphigenia, in a close dress of flesh- coloured silk, so as to expose, unembarrassed by the covering of her looser garments, much more than strict delicacy allowed. The Princess gave her a gentle rebuke by throwing her own veil over her ; but the story soon became public, and was tor- tured into a variety of shapes, and a number of prints appeared pretending to be portraits of the maid of honour in her " naked dress," some of which would make us believe that she had ex- hibited herself almost in a state of nature.* This exaggeration of immodesty seems to have thrown the masquerades into some disrepute, and a vigorous stand was made against them in the spring of 1750, on occasion of the panic caused by the earth- quakes in London ; the attempt to suppress them, defeated now but repeated again after the fearful earthquake which effected the destruction of Lisbon, at the end of 1755, was in the latter case so far effectual, that we hear little of masquerades for seve- ral years. Horace Walpole says, in a letter dated March 22, 1762, "We have never recovered masquerades since the earth- quake at Lisbon." Yet, in the first year after the accession of George III., the example of reviving them began to be set by the court. On the 7th of June, 1763, Walpole, with the earth- quake still in his recollection, describes the magnificence of the masquerade and fireworks given at Richmond House : " A * It is said that on this occasion, the King, provoked by the wayward damsel's costume, having requested permission to place his hand on her breast, she replied that she would put it to a still softer place, and immedi- ately raised it to his royal forehead. it a 44 MUSIC. HANDEL. masquerade," he says, " was a new sight to the young people, who had dressed themselves charmingly, without having the fear of an earthquake before their eyes, though Prince William and Prince Henry were not suffered to be there." When the King of Denmark was in England in 1768, he gave a masque- rade at Ranelagh " to all the world ;" and Walpole observes sarcastically, " The bishops will call this giving an earthquake ; but, if they would come when bishops call, the Bishop of Rome would have fetched forty by this time. Our right reverend fathers have made but a bad choice of their weapon in such a cold, damp climate." An unsuccessful attempt was made to revive public masquerades in J77 1 - As Rich had found a successful rival in Garrick, so Heidegger was eventually eclipsed by a great composer, who, towards the middle of the century, introduced a new style of musical perfor- mance. George William Handel settled in London about the year 1710. He soon obtained the patronage of the Earl of Bur- lington ; and subsequently, in connexion with Senesino and some others, set up what he called an academy of music in the Hay- market. This, however, was broken up, in consequence of his quarrels with his colleagues, and, finding little patronage in England, where the fashionable world were still mad after the Italian singers, he retired to the Continent. He returned to England in the beginning of 1 742 ; and in the subsequent years he produced those noble oratorios, which soon gave him celebrity and riches. Handel, who was celebrated for his love of luxuri- ous living, and his power of deglutition, was as remarkable for his corpulence as Heidegger had been for his ugliness ; and in "The Scaudalizade," a satirical poem published in 1750, when Handel was at the height of his celebrity, the former is intro- duced ridiculing the unwieldy figure of his rival. " 'Ho, there ! to whom none can, forsooth, hold a candle,' CalTd the lovely-faced Heidegger out to George Handel, ' In arranging the poet's sweet lines to a tune, Such as God save the King 1 or the fam'd Tenth of June 1 How amply your corpulence fills up the chair Like mine host at an inn, or a London lord-mayor ; Three yards at the least round about in the waist ; In dimensions your face like the sun in the west. But a chine of good pork, and a brace of good fowls, A dozen-pound turbot, and two pair of soles, With bread in proportion, devour' d at a meal, How incredibly strange, and how monstrous to tell ! Needs must that your gains and your income be large, To support such a vast imsupportdble charge 1 Retrench, or ere long you may set your own dirge.' " THE CHARMING EBUTE. 245 The composer retorts on his antagonist, and expresses indig- nation at the charge of over-eating, which appears not to have been exaggerated, in the foregoing lines : " ' Wouldst upbraid with ill-nature, as monstrous and vast, My moderate eating and delicate taste, When I paid but two hundred a year for my board ? True, my landlord soon after the bargain deplor*d ; Withdrew, became bankrupt, a prey to the law, His effects swallow d up in disputing a flaw * Mong counsel, attorneys, commissioners, and such, And all the long train so accustom' d to touch. Put what is this matter of bankrupt to me ? All folks must abide by the terms they agree : If guilty my stomach, my conscience is free.'' In two prints, nearly alike, and evidently copied from the other, published in 1754, Handel is represented under the title of " The Charming Brute," as an overgrown hog, performing on his instrument, in the midst of a vast assemblage of his favourite provisions, hung round the apartment and against the organ. THE CHARMING BRUTE. The opera, during the theatrical wars, had lost none of its popularity among fashionable society, and was regularly re- cruited by a succession of Italian singers and dancers, who fur- nished subjects of ridicule to the multitude in their personal quarrels, or in their impertinent vanity. Among the " cargoes of Italian dancers" announced by Horace Walpole on the loth of November, 1754, as having newly arrived in the London market, was the celebrated Mingotti, whose rivalry with Van- neschi subsequently disturbed the peace of the theatre in the Haymarket as much as those of Cuzzoni and Faustina had done in former days. Walpole, who noted all these important trifles in his correspondence, says, in the October of 1755, " I believe I 24<5 FIRST APPEARANCE OF FOOTE. scarce ever mentioned to you last winter the follies of the opera: the impertinences of a great singer were too old and too common a topic. I must mention them now, when they rise to any im- provement in the character of national folly. The Mingotti, a noble figure, a great mistress of music, and a most incomparable actress, surpassed anything I ever saw for the extravagance of her humours. She never sang above one night in three, from a fever upon her temper ; and never would act at all when Riccia- relli, the first man, was to be in dialogue with her. Her fevers grew so high, that the audience caught them, and hissed her more than once : she herself once turned and hissed again. . . . Well, among the treaties which a Secretary of State has negoti- ated this summer, he has contracted for a succedaneum for the Mingotti. In short, there is a woman hired to sing when the other shall be out of humour !" The contest between Mingotti and the manager, Vanneschi, which ended in the ruin of the latter, made the proud dame sovereign of the opera, and her airs were proportionally increased. A caricature published on the 8th of October, 1756, represents this creature of fashionable adoration under the title of " The Idol," raised on a stool in- scribed with " 2000 per annum," and receiving the homage of her worshippers of all classes. A fashionable lady, with a pug- dog, exclaims, " 'Tis only pug, and you I love !" A divine, on his knees before the stool, ejaculates, " Unto thee be praise, now and lor evermore !" A nobleman, bringing his subscription of 2000, says to his lady, "We shall have but twelve songs for all this money." His lady replies, " Well, and enough, too, for the paltry trifle !" Other persons are expressing their admira- tion in various ways. The idol, from her throne, sings with contempt " Ha, ru, ra, rot ye, My name is M [Mingotti] ; If you worship me notti You shall all go to potti." The moral of the whole is told in a distich below : " Behold with most indignant scorn the soft enervate tribe, Their country selling for a song : how eager they subscribe ! " While the old drama was thus progressing side by side with the more recently established opera, another class of pieces became extremely popular in the hands of Samuel Foote, who then a young actor, had joined Macklin, when, after his quarrel with Garrick in 1743, he betook himself to the little theatre in the Haymarket, where Foote made his first appearance on the PEP SON AL SATIEE ON THE STAGE. 247 6th of February, 1744. We have had frequent occasions for observing how the passing events of the day were carried on the stage in comedies and pantomimes, as objects of satire. This species of farce was brought to perfection by Foote, whose great talent was that of mimicry, and who delighted his audience by the exact manner in which he imitated the peculiarities and weaknesses of individual contemporaries. He was in all respects the great theatrical caricaturist of the age. The personality of the satire was the grand characteristic of Foote's performances, and one which rendered them dangerous to society, and certainly not to be approved. An affront to the actor was at any t'me enough to cause the offender to be dragged before the world ; and matter in itself of the most libellous description was published without danger, under the fictitious name of a character, the resemblance of which to the original was sufficiently evident to the town. From such tribunals, neither elevation in society, nor respectability of character, are a protection. After working a few years together, Foote and Macklin disagreed, and the latter left him to set up an oratory, under the title of " The British Inquisition," for Henley's success had made the name of oratory popular, and a sort of passion was at this time springing up for lecturing and speechifying. Several oratories arose about the same time, besides a variety of debating clubs, like the celebrated Robin Hood Society. Horace Walpole says, on the 24th of December, 1754, "The new madness is oratories." Foote im- mediately brought out " Macklin and the British Inquisition" on the stage at the Haymarket. From the Haymarket, Foote went to Drury Lane, and enlisted for a while under Garrick, with whom, however, he was never on terms of cordial friend- ship. His " Englishman in Paris," at the commencement of his Drury Lane connexion, was extremely popular ; but another piece, " The Author," although equally well received by the mob, was eventually stopped by the Lord Chamberlain, at the complaint of an individual who was unjustly attacked in it. The Haymarket was an unlicensed theatre, and Foote evaded the law by serving his audience with tea, and calling the per- formance in his bills, " Mr. Foote's giving tea to his friends."* Churchill, who attacked Foote with some bitterness in his * Foote's advertisement ran, "Mr. Foote presents his compliments to his friends and the public, and desires them to drink tea at the little Theatre in the H*} market every morning, at playhouse prices." '1 he house was always crowded, and Foote came forward and said, that, as he had some young actors in training, he would go on with his instructions while tea was preparing. 248 THE MINOR. " Rosciad," and who judged rightly that his performances tended to lower the character of the stage, alludes to this circumstance, and to the similar character of Tate Wilkinson, whom he looked upon as Foote's shadow : " Foote, at Old House, for even Foote will be In self-conceit an actor, bribes with tea ; Which Wilkinson at second-hand receives, And, at the New, pours water on the leaves." At the beginning of the reign of George III. Poote occupied the house alluded to more regularly as a summer theatre, and brought out his farce of the " Minor," which, independent of its personalities, was a violent satire upon the Methodists, and through them upon the more religious part of the community, and contained a considerable quantity of coarse language, and some rather exceptionable morality. The appearance of this piece was the signal for a violent paper war. Foote and his farces were attacked in every way, and the moral tendency of the stage was thus again brought into question under disadvantage for itself. The clergy interfered, and the " Minor" was no longer allowed to be acted. In 1766, Foote obtained a patent for the theatre in the Haymarket, upon which he purchased and pulled down the old house, and built the new one, which was ever after known as the Haymarket Theatre. The course of the theatrical caricaturist was, however, any- thing but smooth. In 1762 Foote brought out " The Orators," the design of which was to ridicule the prevailing taste for speechifying, the affair of the Cock Lane Ghost, and especially the debating society held at the Robin Hood. Among other persons who were to be exposed to satire and ridicule on this occasion, was Dr. Johnson, who had taken an active part in the investigation of the Cock Lane Ghost, and contributed to the exposure of the imposture : Johnson was informed of Foote's design before the farce came out, and intimated to him immedi- ately, that he should be in the theatre with a stout cudgel, ready to fall upon the first person on the stage who attempted to mimic or throw ridicule upon him. The character of the Doctor was omitted, when " The Orators" appeared on the stage. In 1772, Foote's farce of "The Nabob," a satire on the East India politics, nearly involved him in a serious quarrel with some of the directors of the India Company. In 1775, having gathered abroad some scandalous anecdotes of the Duchess of Kingston, he wrote a farce, entitled " The Trip to Calais," in which that notorious woman was grossly caricatured under the name of " Lady Kitty Crocodile." The attack was cruel, FRENCH IMPORTS. 249 because the Duchess was in the midst of her embarrassments relating to the trial for bigamy ; and she had sufficient influence with the Lord Chamberlain, to obtain a refusal to allow it to be acted. Foote expostulated in vain with the Lord Chamberlain, and then threatened the Duchess he would print the farce, unless she gave him two thousand pounds to suppress it. The haughty dame entered into a war of letters with him, and showed that she was no match in caustic satire ; but there is a certain brutality in his way of trampling on an unfortunate woman, which makes us feel how pernicious to society a character like Foote must ever be. A Rev. Mr. Jackson, a writer in some of the newspapers of the day, was the Duchess's agent in her transaction with Foote. The latter, finding he was likely to get nothing out of the Duchess of Kingston, altered the name of his farce to " The Capuchin," omitted all that related to the Duchess, but brought in her agent, the parson, on whom he expended his full measure of scorn and ridicule, and it was thus brought on the stage the following summer. Jackson (it was said, at the instigation of the Duchess of Kingston,) revenged himself by charging Foote with a revolting offence ; and, although he was honourably acquitted, the disgrace bore so heavy upon his mind, that he never recovered it. Foote died on the 2ist of October, 1777. A good print, by Boitard, entitled " The Imports of Great Britain from France ; humbly addressed to the laudable associa- tions of Anti-Grallicans, and the generous promoters of the British arts and manufactories," and published March 7, 1757, exhibits some of what the mob considered the most objectionable articles which France sent over to corrupt the manners and principles of Englishmen. The various groups are described at the foot of the engraving. The rage for French fashions is represented by " Four tackle porters staggering under a weighty chest of Birth-Night Clothes" addressed to a right honourable viscount in St. James's, and doubtless comprising a magnificent costume for the ball on the King's birthday. The love of French cookery appears in " several emaciated high liv'd epicures familiarly receiving a French cook, acquainting him, that, with- out his assistance, they must have perished with hunger." The affected conceit of a French education is pictured in " a lady of distinction, offering the tuition of her son and daughter to a cringing French able, disregarding the corruption of their reli- gion ; so they do but obtain the true French accent ; her frenchi- fied well-bred spouse readily complying, the English chaplain regretting his lost labours." The passion for French artistes FOREIGN MERCHANDIZE. appears in "another woman of quality, in raptures, caressing a French, female dancer, assuring her that her arrival is to the honour and delight of Eng- land ;" the negro page is laughing at the strange taste of his mistress. The other prominent features of the pic- ture are described as follows : " On the front ground, a cask overset, the contents, French cheeses from Normandy, being rajfinie, a blackguard boy stop- ping his nostrils, greatly offend- ed at the haut-gotit; a chest well crammed with tippets, muffs, ribbons, flowers for the hair, and other such materiel bagatelles ; JOBEIGN MEKCHANDIZB. underneath, concealed cam- bricks and gloves ; another chest, containing choice beauty- washes, pomatums, 1'eau d'Hongrie, 1'eau de luce, 1'eau de carme, Ac. &c. &c. ; near, French wines and brandies. At a distance, landing, swarms of milliners, tailors, mantua-makers, frisers, tutoresses for boarding-schools, disguised Jesuits, quacks, valet- de-chambres, &c. &c. &c." Such was the merchandize, which, it, was popularly believed, hindered English ministers from defending our national honour from the insults of our neigh- bours. The outcry against the influence of French fashions and prin- ciples was indeed at its height at the time of publication of this print, and not altogether without reason. Corruption had been progressing so long, that society seemed to be rotten to the very heart, and to require some violent remedy before it could be restored to its normal state. The evil was deeply rooted in the manners of the age, and was imbibed with the first rudiments of fashionable education, of which it was considered a necessary part that young men of family should make the continental tour with a tutor before they were introduced into society at home. They were thus snatched from the indulgences of a university life, to be thrown, unrestrained, amid the vices of France and Italy, which they returned to practise in their own country. The evils of this system were generally felt, and many a moral sermon or bitter satire was written against it, but in vain. The travelling tutors, who were frequently as immoral as their pupils, and encouraged, rather than restrained, them in LOW STATS OF ENGLISH MANNERS. 151 their worst propensities, went popularly by the title of bear- leaders. In England, the common life of a man of fashion, presented a strange mixture of frivolousness and brutality the day spent over the toilette, or at the boudoir of women of fashion, whose principles were no more delicate than their own, lisping scandal and gallantry, and trifling with a pantin,* or some other equally childish plaything, ended commonly in tavern debauchery and street riot, the object of emulation being " To run a horse, to make a match, To revel deep, to roar a catch ; To knock a tottering watchman down, To sweat a woman of the town." In these riots blood was frequently shed, and they sometimes ended fatally, for the sword was always ready in the fray. The exaggeration of this spirit of riot and debauchery produced private associations like the " Hell-fire Club," of the earlier part of the reign of George II., and the fraternity whose voluptuous devotions at Medmenham were so notorious at the beginning of that of George III. The peculiar frame of society tended to diffuse the evil ; for what was looked upon as the beau-monde then lived much more in public than now, and men and women of fashion displayed their weaknesses to the world in public places of amusement and resort with little shame or delicacy. The women often rivalled the men in libertinism, and even emulated them sometimes in their riotous manners. It was this publicity of manners that made the fashionable world collectively and individually, as it were, the property of the town, and not only caused the latter to take a personal interest in it, but produced numerous imita- tors on an humbler scale among the middle and lower classes, and thus spread the poison through every vein. This filled the literature of the day with so much personal scandal ; and hence arose the great success which attended Foote's attempt to drag * A puppet of pasteboard, strung together so that by every touch of the finger it was thrown into a variety of grotesque attitudes. From 1748 to 1750, it was in high vogue among the beau-monde as a diverting play- thing for gentlemen and ladies. The pantin was the subject of several caricatures and ballads in 1748, the year in which it came into fashion in England : one of the former, published in September 1748, was entitled, " Pantin a la Mode : or, Polite Conversation." Another, published in August 1749, is advertised as "A new emblematic print in high taste, representing Folly playing with his pantin." I have not seen these prints, which appear to be very rare. This of course was also one of the fashion- able importations from France. 453 EXTRAVAGANCE OF FASHION IN DEESS. it on the stage. Every man (or woman) who made himself re- markable in fashionable society was a public character, and the satire cast upon him by the writer or by the actor needed no explanation to make it understood. The scandal and disgrace which were thus heaped so plentifully on those who provoked public observation by their extravagance, although long set at defiance, must, in the end, have contributed towards changing the tone of society, by forcing vice to retire into privacy. The general extravagance showed itself in nothing more re- markable than in the fashions of dress, which furnished a subject of never-failing satire from the earlier part of the reign of George II. to the middle of that of his grandson. The hoop- petticoats had been a subject of scandal in the time of George I., but the circular hoops of that period were moderation itself in comparison with the extent of robe given to the ladies of the following generation. At the middle of the century, the hoop began to be made of an oval form, instead of circular, and an immense projection on each side of the body made some of the satirists of the day compare a fashionable woman to a donkey with a pair of panniers. The unsightliness of this costume was increased by the use of a loose flowing robe, called a sack.* In 1747 the great objects of scandal in the dress of the ladies were hoop-petticoats and French pockets, both of which are repre- sented as being very indecorous. The hoop-petticoat and its in- conveniences, were made the subject of innumerable caricatures, many of them in the highest degree indelicate. A print, en- titled " The Review," without date, but evidently of the latter part of the reign of George II., exhibits the inconvenience of the hoop-petticoat in a va- riety of ways, and suggests different methods of remedy- ing it. One of the most in- genious is, that of coaches with moveable roofs, and a frame and pullies to drop the ladies in from the top, so as to avoid the decomposing of their hoops, which necessarily attended their entrance by the door. MODEBN CONTRIVANCES. The great outcry at this time was occasioned by the practice * An example of this dress will be seen above in the cut on p. 250. For CABRIOLET HEAD-DRESSES. 253 of leaving bare too much of the neck and shoulders, and wear- ing the hoop-petticoats short. A poetical description of the ladies' dress, in 1773, directs, " Your neck and your shoulders both naked should be, Was it not for vandyke, blown with chevaux de-frise, * * * * Make your petticoats short, that a hoop eight yards wide May decently shew how your garters are tied." But the attention of the satirist was shortly to be called from the garb of the body to that of the head. Hoop-petticoats dis- appeared early in the reign of George III., and were followed by enormous head-dresses. The poem just quoted describes the dress of the head as being at that time by no means a very prominent part of the costume. /'Hang a small bugle cap on, as big as a crown, Snout it off with a flower, vulgo diet, a pompoon." The first grand advance in decorating this part of the person, was made at the same time with the introduction of cabriolets, in 1755. Horace Walpole writes on the i5th of June of thit year, " All we hear from France is, that a new madness reigns there, as strong as that of Pantins was. This is la fureur des cabriolets, Anglice, one-horse chairs, a mode introduced by Mr. Child :* they not only universally go in them, but wear them ; that is, every thing is to be en cabriolet ; the men paint them on their waistcoats, and have them embroidered for clocks to their stockings ; and the women, who have gone all the winter without anything on their heads, are now muffled up in great caps, with round sides, in the form of, and scarce less than, the wheels of chaises." The fashion was quickly communicated to England, where the cabriolet head-dress was soon improved into post-chaises, chairs and chairmen, and even broad-wheeled wag- gons I The following description is taken from a short poem, entitled " A Modern Morning," written in 1757 ; the lady, after taking her chocolate, has arisen from bed. " Then Coelia to her toilet goes, Attended by some fav'rite beaux, Who fribble it around the room, And curl her hair and clean the comb, And do a thousand monkey tricks That you would think disgraced the sex. & more full account of the dress of this period, the reader is referred to Mr. Fairholt's excellent work, "Costume in England," 8vo. 1846. It will only be necessary to notice on the present occasion some of its more extravagant features. * Josiah Child, brother of the Earl of Tilney. 54 THE ELEVATION OF HAIR-DRESSING. ' Nelly ! why, where "s the creature fled? Put my post-chaise upon my head.' Your chair-and- chairmen, ma'am, is brought.' ' Stupid ! the creature has no thought ! ' ' And, ma'am, the milliner is come, She's brought the broad-wheel* d-waggon home, And 'tis the prettiest little thing, Upon my honour ! * ' Bring ! bring ! bring ! How can you stand and talk about it? You know I die, I die without it ! ' In broadrwheel'd-waggon thus array'd By beaux, and milliner, and maid, Dear Coelia treads the toilet round, In her fair faithful glass 'tis found, And so employs her every sense Twould take a team to draw her thence." A satirist of the day foretells the speedy adoption of similar head-dresses by the gentlemen, and suggests that, as emblema- tic of the political consistency of the day, the men of one party should wear windmills, and the others weathercocks. With the commencement of the reign of George III. hair- dressing became an intricate and difficult science, and was made the subject of several elaborate publications. To raise up the lofty pile of hair, and fill it out with materials to give it due elasticity, to arrange the vast curls that flanked it, and to give grace to the feathers and flowers with which it was crowned, was not within the capacity of every vulgar coiffeur. The in- terior of the mass which rose above the head was filled with wool, tow, hemp, &c., and the quantity of pomatum, and other materials used with it, must have produced an effect calculated to disgust all who were not absolutely mad upon fashion. An ode to the ladies in 1768, printed in the " New Foundling Hos- pital for Wit," describes the lover's astonishment at his mis- tress's head-dress : " When he views your tresses thin Tortur'd by some French friseur ; Horse-hair, hemp, and wool within, Garnish'd with a diamond skewer. " When he scents the mingled steam Which your plaster VI heads are rich in, Lard and meal, and clouted cream, Can he love a walking kitchen ?'' When we consider that the great labour of arranging this strange structure hindered its being refreshed often, and that it was sometimes kept two or three weeks before it was broken up, being merely retouched externally, and covered with fresh ENORMOUS HEAD-DRESSES. 255 odours, to conceal any disagreeable smell which might issue from the interior, we shall readily believe the accounts given by those who wrote and preached against the ridiculous enormities of fashion, and who assure us that the interior of the ladies' head- dresses was commonly filled with vermin. In the London Ma- gazine for August, 1768, a correspondent on this subject says, " I went the other morning to make a visit to an elderly aunt of mine, when I found her pulling off her cap, and tendering her head to the ingenious Mr. Gilchrist, who has lately obliged the public with a most excellent essay upon hair. He asked her how long it was since her head had been opened or repaired. She answered, not above nine weeks. To which he replied, that that was as long as a head could well go in summer, and that there- fore it was proper to deliver it now ; for he confessed that it began to be a little hazarde." The description of the open- ing of the head which fol- lows is almost too disgusting to repeat. The caricaturists, as might be expected, were busy with these monstrous decorations of the head, and they did their best to improve upon the originals. A print pub- lished on the 8th of May, V 1777, represents what is de- -V scribed as " a new-fashioned head-dress for young misses of three-score and ten," which is a picture not much ex- aggerated of the fashion prevalent in that year. Two men are required to place the enormous fabric in situ. The large nosegay, and the long waving plumes are strictly in character. A HEAD-DKESS IN 1777. "But above all the rest A bold Amazon's crest Waves, nodding from shoulder to shoulder ; At once to surprise, And to ravish all eyes, To frighten and charm the beholder." 256 A FASHIONABLE PARTY. A NEW OPERA-GLASS. The satirists of the day lament over the devastation committed throughout the feathered creation in order to supply this bor- rowed plumage; and represent the unfortunate bipeds of the wing wandering about in unnatural and unprovoked bareness, while their two- legged rivals in the ranks of humanity were rendering themselves no less ridiculous in thus appropriating their spoils. The immense curls on each side of the head were peculiar also to the year just men- tioned. In a spirited carica- ture entitled "A new opera- glass for the year 1777," it is suggested that these spacious curls should be turned to a useful purpose. " Behold how Jemmy treats the fair, And makes a telescope of hair ! How will this suit high-headed lasses, If curls are turned to optic glasses !" The extravagant costume of this and the following years is best caricatured in a plate representing four ladies playing at cards, a reflection, at the same time, upon the violent passion for gaming which characterized this age, and which was attended with so many tragical consequences. Two of the ladies are here quarrelling ; one having accused the other of bad play, her anta- gonist is preparing to decide the dispute with the candlestick. This print, en- titled " Settling the odd trick," was " published by M. Barley, Feb. 26, 1778." Caps now came into fashion to cover the immense heap of hair; and these were equally remarkable for their ex- travagance, rising high above the head, A BIRD OF P.EADISE. a ?, d fading out at the sides into a pile ol nbands and ornament. In these, caricature could hardly improve upon the strange unwieldy form FWras-icut.FSA THE CALASH. 257 of the originals, and it will be enough to give two or three specimens of the fashionable head-dresses, as they were actually worn. The first, of the date 1780, is taken from a print entitled " The bird of Paradise," but is understood to represent the cele- brated Mary Anne Robinson (the Perdtta of the amorous history of the Prince of Wales, afterwards George IV). A card beside her, inscribed, "Admit Mrs. M to the masked ball," shows that she is in full dress ; yet there is nothing extravagant in her costume except the enormous coiffure and cap, which look as though they had been stolen from some gigantic dame of the land of Brobdignag. Another cap, equally preposterous, and of nearly the same date, is represented in our next cut, which is said to be a portrait of Mrs. Cosway, the artist. It would be in vain to go on giving examples of the different forms of head-dresses which now came into vogue ; for the characteristic of fashion seems to have become suddenly variety instead of uniformity, and it was almost impossible to meet two ladies of high ton the outlines of whose costume at all resembled each other. "Now drest in a cap, now naked in none, Now loose in a mob, now close in a Joan ; Without handkerchief now, and now buried in ruff; Now plain as a Quaker, now all of a puff, Now a shape in neat stays, now a slattern in jumps ; Now high in French he. Is, now low in your pumps ; Now monstrous in houp, now traplsh, and walking With your petticoats clung to your heels, like a maulkin ; Like the clock on the tower, that shews you the weather, You are hardly the same for two days together." One description of cap or bon- net continued, however, for a XU- \\ J"? /ime in favour. It was Mflff^N \\ called a calash, and is said to have been invented in 1765, by the Duchess of Bedford. The calash was formed like the hood of a carriage, and was strengthened with whalebone hoops, so that by means of a string in front, connected with the hoops, it could either be MISS CALASH IN CONTEMPLATION. 25 8 THE MACARONI CLUB. drawn forwards over the face, or it might be thrown backwards over the hair. In the above cut, taken from a print engraved in 1 780, the calash is thrown back, and the string hangs loosely over the face. In the next cut the calash is shown as drawn forwards ; and the second lady wears another of the numerous extravagant head-dresses of the day. This group is taken from a print published in 17 83, and entitled " A Trip to Scarborough." Several other ladies, with equally grotesque head-dresses, though dissimi- lar, are of the party. Within a few years, however, after this date, these extravagances had disappeared, and the heads of our fair countrywomen were reduced somewhat nearer to their natural size. Extravagance in male fashions, among the more re- stricted number of individuals who indulged in it, followed close upon the heels of extra- vagance in the other sex. The grand phenomena of the years 1772 and 1773 were the Macaronis. Men of fashion in the earlier part of the reign of George II. had been com- monly designated by the ap- pellation of beaux ; about the year 1 749 they began to be termed Ji 'ibbles, a name which con- tinued in use during the first years of the reign of George III. Then a number of young men who had made the tour, and had returned from Italy with all the vices and follies they had picked up there, formed themselves into a club, which, from the dish which peculiarly distinguished their table, was called the Macaroni Club. The members of this club soon became distin- guished by the title of Macaronis ; it was their pride to carry to the utmost excess every description of dissipation, effeminacy of manners, and modish novelty of dress. The Macaronis first inundated the town in the year 1772, as just stated. "One will naturally inquire," says a satirical writer in the Universal Magazine for the April of that year, " whence originated the prolific family of the Macaronis ? who is their sire ? To which I answer, that they may be derived from the Homunculus of Sterne ; or it may be said the Macaronis are indeed the offspring of a LADIES OF FASHION. THE MACARONIS. 259 body, but not of an individual. This same body was a .many- headed monster in Pall Mall, produced by the demoniac com- mittee of depraved taste and exaggerated fancy, conceived in the courts of France and Italy, and brought forth in England." Horace Walpole, writing in the same month of April, 1772, gave a somewhat different pedigree ; he ascribed the growth of this monster to the enormous wealth imported from our con- quests in India, and its extravagance was already converting back wealth into poverty " Lord Chatham begot the East India Company ; the East India Company begot Lord Clive ; Lord Clive begot the Maca- ronis ; and they begot po- verty ; and all the race are still living." The Macaronis, in 1772, were distinguished especially by an immense knot of arti- ficial hair behind, by a very small cocked-hat, by an enormous walking- stick, with long tassels, and by jacket, waistcoat, and breeches, of very close cut. The accompanying caricature is taken from the number of the Uni- versal Magazine above al- luded to. A MACARONI IN 1772. The Macaronis soon made an extraordinary noise ; everything that was fashionable was a la Macaroni. Even the clergy had their wigs combed, their clothes cut, "their delivery refined," ]>rehen>ions ; and imprudent threats were held out against VVilkes and the populace. It was this unwise persecu- tion alone that made Wilkes a hero. After he had secured his election, Wilkes declared his inten- tion of surrendering himself to the court which had outlawed him ; for this purpose, he presented himself in the court of King's Bench on the 2oth of April ; but, in consequence of some legal informalities, he was then allowed to depart, and a writ having been issued, he was brought before the court on the 27th, and then committed to the custody of the marshal of the King's Bench prison. He left the court in a hackney coach, but the mob, which was again numerous and riotous, took off' the horses at Westminster Bridge, and after forcing the marshal in whose custody he was, out of the coach as they passed Temple Bar, drew their favourite through the city to a public-house in Spitalfields. But as soon as the mob had partially dispersed, Wilkes escaped at midnight by a back door, and repaired to the King's Bench prison, where he surrendered himself into the marshal's custody. When it was known next day that he was in prison, a mob collected outside the walls, and shouted all day for Wilkes and Liberty. A body of horse-guards, sent to the spot, and stationed near the prison, only served to irritate the populace ; the latter, who assembled daily at the same place, committed, as we are told, no further riot than shouting " Wilkes and Liberty," yet the guards were always brought out in an ostentatious manner to watch them, and each party abused and threatened the other, until the loth of May, when the new parliament was to meet, and when the mob believed that Wilkes was to be taken out of prison to attend in his place in the house. They accordingly attended in greater numbers than usual. A large force of soldiers had been stationed in front of the prison, and, by an uniortunate coincidence, they were a Scottish regiment, and they appear to have shewn some- what too openly their hatred of the English mob. The latter became exceedingly riotous, and dirt and stones were thrown. Two of the Surrey magistrates read the riot act, but it is said not to have been heard ; the soldiers fired, as it appears, with great haste and rashness, and many of the mob were killed and wounded. Three of the soldiers quitted their ranks, to follow one of the rioters whom they had singled out, and at some MASSACRE OF ST. GEORGE'S FIELDS. 311 distance from the scene of riot entered a cow-house, where they deliberately shot a young man named Allen, who had taken no part whatever in the proceedings of the day. The mob now became infuriated, and they added to the general excitement by parading the body of Allen through the streets. Prosecutions for murder were lodged against the soldiers and an officer implicated in the death of Allen, and against the Surrey magistrates, who had ordered soldiers to fire at the mob, and verdicts were given against the former ; but they were screened by the court, which, in a very unadvised manner, publicly approved and praised the conduct of the soldiers, whereas the three who had killed Allen were at least guilty of a breach of military discipline in quitting their ranks. This only added to the popular irritation : the riot was long remembered as the " massacre of St. George's Fields ;" and the mob increased in strength, and became more violent. Several other mobs arose in London at the same time, who, as Horace Walpole observes, " only took advantage of so favourable a season. The coal-heavers began, and it is well," Walpole observes, " it is not a hard frost, for they have stopped all coals coming to town. The sawyers rose too, and at last the sailors, who had committed great outrages in merchant ships, and prevented them from sailing. The last mob, however, took an extraordinary turn ; for many thousand sailors came to petition the parliament yesterday (May n), but in the most respectful and peaceable manner; desired only to have their grievances examined ; if reasonable, redressed ; if not reasonable, they would be satisfied. Being told that their flags and colours with which they paraded were illegal, they cast them away. Nor was this all ; they declared for the king and parliament, and beat and drove away Wilkes's mob." These riotous pro- ceedings dwindled into a sort of civil war between the sailors and coal-heavers, which, strange to say, was allowed to continue for several weeks, although many lives were lost. On the 22nd of June, Walpole writes, " The coal-heavers, who, by the way, are all Irish whiteboys, after their battles with the sailors, turned themselves to general war, robbed in companies, and murdered wherever they came. This struck such a panic, that in Wapping nobody dared to venture abroad, and the city began to find no joke in such liberty." It required again the active intervention of the guards to quell this disturbance. In the meanwhile the court of King's Bench had reversed Wilkes's outlawry on account of some informalities in the pro- ceeding : and judgment was given on the original sentence, by 3ia NEW MIDDLESEX ELECTION. which he was condemned to pay a fine of 500?., and be imprisoned ten calendar months for writing the North Briton, No. 45, and to pay another fine of 5oo/., and be imprisoned twelve calendar mouths in addition to the 1'ormer term of imprisonment for pul lishing the " Essay on Woman," which in reality had heen published by the ministers. Whatever excuse may be made (or the fust part of the sentence, none can he found lor the extreme injustice of punishing a, man for the publication of what he had carefully concealed from public view, and a copy of which had only been procured by the basest treachery. The natural con- sequence was, that \Vilkes, in his imprisonment, became a more formidable opponent than when at liberty, and that he only sank into insignificance when he ceased to be an object of persecution. Soon alter the Middlesex election, Cook, the other member, died, and on the issuing of a new writ, \Vilkes, from his prison, recommended his friend and supporter, Serjeant Glynn, who heat the court candidate. Sir "William Proctor, by a large ma- jority. The latter had recourse to Wilkes's own weapons, and hired a mob, which acted with so little moderation, that one of the popular party, named Clarke, was killed. Two of Proctor's chairmen were immediately brought before a jury at the Old Bailey, charged with murder, and one of them, turning out to be a Scotchman, was condemned, but received a pardon, to the great disappointment of the London mob. On the meeting of parliament in November, the affair of Wilkes was again debated fiercely during several weeks, and on the 3rd of February, 1769, he was again ex| elled the House of Commons. It was on this occasion that Edmund Buike, who spoke with great force against the expulsion, described the proceedings of the govern- ment, as " the lil I h act of the tragi-comedy a( ted by his majesty's servants, for the benefit of Mr. Wilkes, at the expense of the constitution." A new writ was issued for Middlesex, and Wilkes again offered himself as a candidate. Ihe election took place at Brentford, on the loth of March, when a Mr. Dingley under- took to be the ministerial champion, but he could not approach the hustings or find any one who would venture to propose him, and Wilkes was re-elected without opposition. The ministerial majority in the House of Commons flew into a rage, and, after another violent delate, declared the prisoner incapable of re- election, and issued a new writ next day, and Colonel Luttrell, then member lor Bossiney, was engaged to stand lor Middlesex. Wilkes, however, was again elected by a large majority, and London was as usual illuminated. But on this occasion the MINISTERIAL MORTIFICATIONS. 313 house voted that the sheriff had made a wrong return, and that Luttrell's name should be inserted instead of that of Wilkes as the member for Middlesex. Thus ended the war between "the two kings of Brentford," * as people jokingly termed King George and John "Wilkes. The mortifications of the court were not, however, confined to the " war" at Brentford ; the ministers had again tried the unwise experiment of getting up a popular demonstration in their own favour. The first attempt was made in the county of Essex, "which," Horace Walpole observes, "being the great county for calves, produced nothing but ridicule." Dingley, the unsupported candidate for Middlesex, was the hero of this attempted demonstration, which miscarried through his own imprudence. Another attempt was made, and some signatures were obtained to a loyal address, which was to be presented to the king on the 22nd of March, by a procession of six hundred merchants and others. They set out amid hisses and outcries of every description, but they made their way in tolerable order as far as Temple Bar. There the mob had assembled in great force, and, having closed the gates against them, received them, with a shower of mud and stones, which obliged them to disperse and save themselves in any streets and lanes that were not blocked up. This was popularly termed " The battle of Temple Bar." About a third of the loyal addressers re-assembled at some distance in advance of the scene of their discomfiture, and formed again in procession ; but they were soon overtaken by the mob, which had obtained a hearse drawn by four horses, on one side of which hung a large escutcheon, with a coarse representation of the " massacre of St. George's Fields," while a similar escutcheon on the other side, represented the slaughter of Clarke at Brentford. This was marched slowly at the head of the procession, and thus, in the midst of a dreadful uproar, they reached St. James's, where the mob became more riotous than ever. The king and his ministers were obliged to wait a considerable length of time before the address could be presented ; the mob had tried to seize the important document, and they had so pelted the chairman of the committee of merchants with mud that he was unfit to appear with it. Lord Talbot came down end seized one of the rioters, but the mob pressed round him bad broke the steward's staff in his hand. Other unpopular nobLmen received ill-treatment. At length, after fifteen persona had been captured by the guards, the mob dispersed, and the * An allusion, of course, to tl:e two kinps of Brentford, introduced in the Duke of Buckingham's celebrated satire, "The Rehearsal." WILKES LORD MAYOR. address was presented. In the popular prints representing these disturbances, which were sold in great numbers, the tumult before St. James's is entitled " the sequel to the battle of Temple Bar." It was about this period of agitation that some of the most violent of the political caricatures were ushered into the world, with a host of publications of different kinds, calculated to inflame people's minds. Political magazines were now established, such as the Oxford Magazine and the Political Register, bring- ing their monthly cargoes of caricatures and inflammable matter, and the engravings which had appeared singly during the earlier years of the reign were re-published, and in several instances collected into volumes. But new political heroes were coming on the scene, as objects of popular worship or hatred. Wilkes's career may be said to have closed with his release from imprison- ment in 17/0. A committee of men who called themselves " The supporters of the Bill of Eights," raised a subscription which relieved him from the pecuniary embarrassment into which he had been thrown by his own improvidence as much as by the persecutions to which he had been exposed ; and a week after he left the prison he was admitted an alderman of London. In 1774, he and his friend Serjeant Glynn were elected members for Middlesex without opposition, and he was now allowed to take his seat in the house unmolested. The same year he was elected lord mayor, and he subsequently obtained the more lucrative and permanent office of chamberlain. In 1780, he was re-elected for Middlesex, and in 1788 he obtained a vote of the house to expunge from its journals the declarations and orders formerly passed against him. He had now, however, be- come a very insignificant member of the House of Commons ; and, having made the most of his patriotism, he exhibited himself as a remarkable instance of ter- giversation, disclaiming his own acts, and making no scruple of expressing his con- tempt for the opinions of his former friends. In 1 7 84, several caricatures cele- brated the reconciliation of the "two kings of Brentford." The best of these, published on the ist of May, of that year, is entitled "The New Coalition," and represents the king and Wilkes em- bracing, the latter holding the cap of THB RECONCILIATION, liberty reversed. The patriot says to DEATH OF WILKES. 315 the monarch, "I now find that you are the best of princes." King George replies, " Sure ! the worthiest of subjects, and most virtuous of men !" Another caricature, published on the 3rd of May, represents the King, Lord Thurloe, and Wilkes, leagued in amity together ; while a third, the work of some unscrupulous democrat, represents Wilkes and the king hanged on one tree, with the inscription, "Give justice her claims." The " two kings of Brentford" were now indeed equally unpopular with the mob ; and at the general election in 1790, Wilkes received the most humiliating defeat on the very hustings where he had so often triumphed in his days of " patriotism." He died on the 26th of December, 1797, and was interred in a vault in Grosvenor Chapel, South Audley Street, where a plain marble tablet, described him simply as " a fiieud of liberty." 316 CHAPTER IX. GEORGE III. Violent Political Agitation The North Administration The Foxes Re- monstrances and Petitions The Button Maker Liberty of the Press Caricatures of the American War Admiral Keppel War with France an represents an exam- ple of royal "affability." The King and Queen, in their rural walks, arrive at , a dirty hut, the occupant] of which, no very high sample of humanity, is feeding his pigs with wash. The vacant stare on his countenance shows him overwhelmed with the rapid succession of royal interro- gatives, " Well, friend, where a' you going, hay ? what's your name, hay ? where d' ye live, hay ? hay ?" These satirical attacks on royal manners were continued through the whole of the revolutionary period, and anywhere but in England they could not have failed to bring the person of the sovereign into contempt. The King's familiarity of manners, approaching to vulgarity, was exhibited in another caricature by Gillray, published in the month of June, 1797, representing a scene on the esplanade at Weymouth. The King, distinguished by his awkward and shuffling gait (which is ROYAL AFFABILITY. 4 6 4 ROYAL MANNERS. not much exaggerated in the picture), has a word to say to every one of the crowd through which he is walking. The con- stant practice of taking the air in uncere- monious excursions, and his great attach- ment to hunting, gave frequent occasions for bringing forth these qualities of the King, and led to scenes of a ridiculous kind. One of these furnished the subject of a caricature, published on the and of Novem- ber, 1797, representing his Majesty "learn- ing to make apple dumplings." The King, in his pursuit of the chase, is represented as having arrived at the cottage of an old woman, occupied in a manner which is said to have drawn forth exclamations of aston- ishment from the curious and admiring monarch ; " Hay ! hay ! apple dumplings ! how get the apples in ! how ? are they made without seams?" This subject had already been treated by Peter Pindar : A KINO. THE KINO AND THE APPLE DUMPLINGS. " Once on a time, a monarch, tir'd with hooping, Whipping, and spurring, Happy in worrying A poor, defenceless, harmless buck, (The horse and rider wet as muck), From his high consequence and wisdom stooping, Enter'd through curiosity a cot, Where sat a poor old woman and her pot. The wrinkled, blear-ey*d, good old granny, In this same cot, illum'd by many a cranny. ROYAL WISDOM. 463 Had finish'd apple dumplings for her pot : In tempting row the naked dumplings lay, When, lo! the monarch in his usual way, Like lightning spoke, ' What this ? what this ? what ! what ?' Then taking up a dumpling in his hand, His eyes with admiration did expand ; And oft did majesty the dumpling grapple : 'Tis monstrous, monstrous hard, indeed !' he cried ; ' What makes it, pray, so hard ]' The dame replied, Low curtseying, ' Please your majesty, the apple.' * Very astonishing indeed ! strange thing !' Turning the dumpling round, rejoined the king, ' 'Tis most extraordinary then, all this is It beats Pinetti's conjuring all to pieces Strange I should never of a dumpling dream ! But, Goody, tell me where, where, where's the seam ?' 'Sir, there's no seam,' quoth she ; ' I never knew That folks did apple dumplings sew.' ' No !' cried the staring monarch with a grin, ' How, how the devil got the apple in T On which the dame the curious scheme reveal' d By which the apple lay so sly conceal' d, Which made the Solomon of Britain start ; Who to the palace with full speed repair'd, And queen, and princesses so beauteous, scar'd, All with the wonders of the dumpling art. There did he labour one whole week, to show The wisdom of an apple dumpling maker ; And, lo ! so deep was majesty in dough, The palace seem'd the lodging of a baker 1" In the caricatures on more general subjects of a later period than that of which we are now speaking, we shall often find > JOTFCL NKW8. these personal weaknesses of the royal family the love of H H GILLRAY AND GEORGE III. money, the homely savings, the familiar air, the taste for gossip introduced. A caricature by Gillray, published in 1792, after the arrival of the news of the defeats of Tippoo Saib in India, represents Dundas, in whose province the Indian affairs lay, bringing the joyful intelligence to the royal huntsman and his consort. It is entitled, " Scotch Harry's News ; or Nincom- poop in high glee." The exulting secretary of state, who is thus designated, announces that " Seringapatam is taken Tippoo is wounded and millions of pagodas secured." The vulgar-looking King, with a strange mixture of ideas of Indian news and hunting, breaks out into a loud " Tally ho ! ho ! ho ! ho !" while his queen, whose head is running entirely on the gain likely to result from these new conquests, exclaims, " the dear, sweet pagodas !" The caricaturist who thus burlesqued royalty, had a pique against George III., very similar to that of Hogarth against George II. Gillray had accompanied Loutherbourg into France, to assist him in making sketches for his grand picture of the siege of Valenciennes. On their return, the King, who made great pretensions to be a patron of the arts, desired to look over their sketches, and expressed great admiration of the drawings of Loutherbourg, which were plain landscape sketches, finished sufficiently to be perfectly intelligible. But when he came to Gillray's rough but spirited sketches of French officers and soldiers, he threw them aside with contempt, merely observ- ing, "I don't understand these caricatures." The mortified artist took his revenge by publishing a large print of the King examining a portrait of Oliver Cromwell, executed by Cooper, to which he gave the title of " A connoisseur examining a Cooper." The royal countenance exhibits a curious mixture of astonishment and alarm as he contemplates the features of the great overthrower of kings, whose name was at this moment put forth as the watchword of revolutionists. The King is burning a candle-end on a save-all ! This print was published on the 1 8th of June, 1792; Gillray, who had not the same dependence on court as Sayer, who was much inferior to him in talent, seldom loses an opportunity of turning the King to ridicule. Nor did Pitt always escape his satire. The young minister, who had so suddenly risen to the summit of power, and now somewhat haughtily lorded it over his fellow statesmen, seems to have given offence to the artist, who, on the 2oth of December, 1791, caricatured him as an upstart fungus, springing suddenly out of the hot-bed of royal favour, which is somewhat rudely com- CAEICATURES ON PITT. 467 A FUNGUS. pared to a dung-hill. The print is entitled " An excrescence a fungus, alias, a toad-stool upon a dung-hill." The thin meagre figure of the prime minister was no less fruitful a matter for jest, than that of his fat and slovenly opponent Fox. In one of Gill- ray's prints, dated the i6th of March, 1792, that caricaturist has seized upon an equivocal phrase in one of the statesman's speeches, and, under the title of a " bottomless pitt," has given us a characteristic sketch of his figure and his gesture. The determination of the Eng- lish court to resist all demands for reform, and to turn a deaf ear to popular complaints, had the natural effect of provoking agita- tion. The opposition in parliament, iti spite of many defections, became, under its old leaders, Fox and Sheridan, and some of the young and rising debaters, such as Grey, Erskine, Lord Lauder- dale, Whitbread, and others, louder and more menacing. Within par- liament, every question that would admit of a debate, was contested with the greatest obstinacy. The session of 1 792 was first occupied with the foreign policy of the preceding year, which, whether in Europe or in India, was analyzed and bitterly attacked. Wilberforce's question of the abolition of negro slavery em- barrassed the ministers, whose chief argument against it was that it numbered among its advo- cates some of the revolutionary reformers, and among the rest Thomas Paine ; they disposed of it eventually by a motion for gradual abolition. The detection of a number of flagrant instances of improper interference in elections gave a new force to the question of parliamentary reform, which was brought H H a 'A BOTTOMLESS PITT.' 4^8 PARLIAMENTARY REFORM. forward at the end of April by Grey and Fox, and violently opposed by Pitt and by Burke. The arguments reproduced by each successive speaker on the ministerial benches was the impolicy of the time at which the question was brought for- ward, and the danger of making concessions to popular violence ; and the court in 1792, seemed resolved to raise the reputation and importance of Thomas Paine and his " Rights of Man," in the same way it had, more than twenty years before, raised up John Wilkes, his North Briton, and his " Essay on Woman." Burke, who opposed this motion with great warmth, and who declared his belief that the House of Commons was as perfect as human nature would permit it to be, flew out against French revolutionists and English political societies, and talked of the factious men with which England abounded, and who were urging this country towards blood and cpnfusion. In the heat of party faction, the ministers exaggerated greatly the real danger they had to apprehend from people of this description, while it was equally under-valued by their opponents. If, however, the question of parliamentary reform was, in point of numbers, weakly supported in the house, it was making substantial advances among people out of doors. In the debates in the House of Commons, Fox took every occasion of remind- ing those who were now in power of their advocacy of reform when in opposition, and especially recalled to their memory a meeting on the subject, held at the Thatched House Tavern, in 1782, when Pitt and the Duke of Richmond had joined hand in hand with Major Cartwright and Home Tooke. These men had there been as decided instigators of se- dition as those to whom tn_/y now applied the epithet. But a few years of gratified ambition had made Pitt and Richmond the most resolute oppo- MAJOB OABTWBI^T. ^ S libera j eaSUreS while Cartwright* and * The figure of Major Cartwright is taken from a print attributed to POLITICAL ASSOCIATIONS. 4 6 9 Tooke, who had not been exposed to the same seductions, continued to walk in their old path. Parliamentary reform had now become the watchword of several of the political clubs, which were increas- ing in numbers, as well as in the violence of their language. A few weeks had seen the formation of the " Corresponding Society," which placed itself in immediate communication with some of the most violent clubs in Paris, and which openly demanded universal suffrage and annual parliaments ; and now, in the month of April, 1 792, arose the " Society of the Friends of the People," which was more moderate in its language and demands, and counted in its ranks several noblemen and leading members of Parliament, and many other persons distinguished in litera- ture and science. It was at the desire of this latter society, that Grey and Erskine, who were both members, brought the question of reform before the House of Commons, in the spring of 1792 ; and it was resolved that they should bring forward a more formal motion on the subject in the ensuing session. The ministry dreaded the way in which the opposition was thus strengthening itself with political associations, and deter- mined to take measures to counteract them, and to suppress the quantity of inflammator}' materials which were now spread about the country in the shape of seditious writings. The gradual and effective manner in which the ministers paved their way for hostile steps against sedition at home and designs from abroad, by addressing themselves to people's passions, and exciting their apprehensions, is deserving of admiration. They even contrived to make the odium of sedition recoil heavily upon the heads of the leaders of the opposition in parliament, who were represented as nourishing concealed views of ambition, and as close imitators PATRIOTS AMUSING THEMSELVES. Gillray, published in 1784, in which he la caricatured as "the Drum-major of Sedition." 470 QUARREL IN THE MINISTRY. of the worst of the ultra-democrats of France. In a caricature by Gillray, published on the ipth of April, 1/92, and entitled, " Patriots amusing themselves ; or, Swedes*, practising at a post," Fox and Sheridan are perfecting themselves in the use of fire-arms. Dr. Priestley stands behind, holding two pamphlets in his hand, entitled "On the glory of revolutions," and "On the folly of religion and order," and says to his colleagues, " Here's plenty of wadding for to ram down the charge with, to give it force, and to make a loud report." Fox, bearing the French cockade, with the inscription " fa ira" is firing a blunderbuss ; while Sheridan, loading his pistol, exclaims, " Well ! this new game is delightful ! O heavens ! if I could but once pop the post ! "Then you and me, Dear brother P., Would sing with glee, Full merrily, Ca ira I fa ira I fa ira /'' The post at which they are shooting is rudely moulded into the form of King George, surmounted by the royal hunting cap. The success which these attempts on people's fears and prejudices met with, encouraged the ministry to proceed, and they soon ventured to make a direct attack on the liberty or rather, in this case, on the licence of the press. On the 2ist of May appeared a royal proclamation against seditious meetings and writings, but which was more especially aimed at the societies above alluded to. It spoke particularly of the correspondences said to be carried on with designing men in foreign parts, with a view to forward their criminal purposes in this country. This proclamation was violently condemned in parliament, by the opposition, as an injudicious and uncalled-for measure ; and it produced debates in both houses, which shewed a number of desertions from the popular party. Among the most important in the House of Lords were the Duke of Portland and the Prince of Wales, who both spoke energetically in favour of the proclamation. At this moment some divisions shewed themselves also in the midst of the ministerial camp. There had never been any cordiality between the premier and the chancellor, since the treacherous conduct of the latter on the occasion of the regency bill; and Thurlow not only spoke contemptuously of Pitt in private society, but he more than once attacked his measures in * An allusion to the assassination of the King of Sweden, in the preced- ing year. DISMISSAL OF LORD THURLOW. 471 the house. The King had a great disinclination to parting with his chancellor, and things were allowed to go on for some time, until, in the session of 1 792, the latter made a gross attack in the House of Lords on some of Pitt's law measures. It is even said that the King, knowing the mutual feelings of his two ministers, and attached by long habit to Thurlow, had hesitated more than once which of them should be the sacrifice ; but the Queen was a firm friend to Pitt, and when, at length, at the beginning of the session, the provoked premier forced the King to an alternative, it was notified to Thurlow that he must resign. Thurlow obeyed, much against his inclination ; though, on account of business pending in the Court of Chancery, he con- sented to remain at his post till the end of the session. On the day of prorogation, the ijjth of June, he gave up the seals, which were placed in commission, but which were subsequently given to his old rival Lord Loughborough, who was one of the deserters from the Whig phalanx. The caricatures on the dis- missal of Thurlow were bitterly sarcastic. One by Gillray, published on the 24th of May, entitled " The fall of the VVolsey of the Woolsack," represents him engaged in a desperate struggle for the insignia of office against the King and his two ministers, Pitt and Dundas. Another caricature by the same artist, published on the pth of June, and entitled " Sin, Death, and the Devil," is a finely executed parody on the scene between those three characters in Milton, but it involves too coarse an outrage on the Queen, who is represented as the personification of Sin, rushing to separate the two combatants, Death (bearing the semblance of Pitt) and Satan (who exhibits the dark frowning countenance of Thurlow). It was soon seen that Pitt's agitation against revolutionary principles had a further object than the mere repression of domestic sedition. The countenance shewn by the minister towards France was outwardly mysterious and equivocal, though not absolutely threatening ; but in secret the English court was approving if not abetting the continental confederacy which was at the same moment forming with the avowed purpose of restoring monarchy in France by force of arms. A few months left no doubt that England had looked with favour upon the secret treaty of Pilnitz. On the appearance of the royal proclamation in May, the French ambassador, Chauvelin, who had but recently arrived in that capacity, made a formal remonstrance against that part of it which alluded to the correspondence with persons in foreign parts, as calculated to convey an impression that the English government gave credit 47* STATE OF FRANCE. to reports that France was a party to the seditious practices in England, and that England looked upon her neighbour with hostile feelings. The reply of the English secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Lord Grenville, breathed the strongest senti- ments of peace and amity, and was accompanied with expressions that gave great satisfaction to the French revolutionary govern- ment, which had suspected a secret understanding between the English court and those who were leaguing against it on the continent. Encouraged by Lord Grenville's language on this occasion, the French government made a subsequent application, through its ambassador, to engage the English King to use his good offices with his allies to avert the attack with which it was threatened from without. The reply on this occasion was conveyed in a much less satisfactory tone : Lord Grenville said, as an excuse for refusing to accede to the wishes of France, " that the same sentiments which engaged his Britannic majesty not to interfere with the internal affairs of France, equally tended to induce him to respect the rights and independence of other sovereigns, and particularly those of his allies." Down to this moment the French government appears to have placed entire faith in the good intentions of this country ; but the only sense which it could possibly make of this document was that it could no longer reckon on the friendship of England ; and this, joined with the arrogant manifestoes now published by the courts of Berlin and Vienna, drove the French to desperation, destroyed entirely the little spirit of moderation that remained, and, no doubt, contributed to the disastrous scenes which followed. The calamities of that unhappy country now succeeded one another in rapid succession. The proclamations of the allies declared very unadvisedly that for some months the King of France had been acting under constraint, and that he was not sincere in his concessions and declarations. This proceeding only tended to aggravate the French populace, and the fearful events of the loth of August overthrew the throne, and established the triumph of democracy. The English ambassador was immediately recalled from Paris, on the pretext that his mission was at an end so soon as the functions of royalty were suspended. The French government still attempted to avert the hostility of England, and kept their ambassador in London, although the King and his ministers refused to acknowledge him in a public capacity. The horrible massacres of September quickly followed to add to the general consternation ; and vast numbers of French priests and refugees flocked to this country, to attract the sympathy of Englishmen by their misfortunes, and increase the ALARMING DECREE. 473 detestation of French republicanism by their reports of the atrocities which had driven them away. Various acts followed which shewed too clearly the inclination of the French to propagate their opinions in other countries. In the National Convention, which was called together at the end of September, two members were elected from England, Thomas Paine and Dr. Priestley ; the latter declined the nomination, but Paine accepted it, and proceeded to Paris to enter upon his legislative duties. Addresses and congratulations, couched in exaggerated and inflammatory language, were sent to the Convention from some of the English political societies, which laid those societies open to new suspicions ; and these suspicions, and the fears consequent upon them, were increased by successes of the republican arms, and the arrogant tone now taken by the Convention itself. On the i9th of November the Assembly passed by acclamation, the famous decree, " The National Con- vention decree, in the name of the French nation, that they will grant fraternity and assistance to all those people who wish to procure liberty ; and they charge the executive power to send orders to the generals to give assistance to such people, and to defend citizens who have suffered and are now suffering in the cause of liberty." This was a plain announcement of a universal crusade against all established and monarchical governments, and, though itself but an empty vaunt, was calculated greatly to increase the alarm which already existed in this country. The seed which had been sown so widely by Burke's " Reflections" was thus ripened into a deep hatred of France and Frenchmen, which was kept up by the activity of the government agents throughout the country. Anti-revolution societies were formed, and exerted themselves to spread the flame ; and they published innumerable pamphlets, containing exaggerated narratives of the crimes committed in France, and a variety of other subjects calculated to inflame men's passions in favour of the crown and the church. The political societies were described as secret conspiracies against the constitution, and, as the meeting of parliament approached, the ministers increased the panic by calling out the militia to protect the government against what were probably visionary dangers of conspiracy and revolt. On the 1 3th of December, the session of parliament was opened with the evident prospect of a general war ; and the King's speech spoke of plots and conspiracies at home fomented by foreign incendiaries, and announced that it had been considered necessary to augment the military and naval forces of the kingdom. The opposition, which had lost 474 COMPULSATOEY FEEDING. much in numbers, was warm, yet more moderate than usual in its language ; it deplored the occurrence of seditious pro- ceedings, wherever they existed, but blamed the government for magnifying imaginary dangers and for creating unnecessary alarm ; it deprecated the haste with which ministers were hurrying the country into an unnecessary and, probably, a calamitous war, and urged the propriety of re-establishing the diplomatic communications between this country and France, with the hope of averting the disasters of war by means of friendly negotiations. All these efforts, however, were in vain ; our ministers rejected the French offers of negotiation with contempt; and at the beginning of 1793, M. Chauveliu, whom the French still considered in the light of an ambassador, was ordered to leave the kingdom. When 'all hopes of avoiding hostilities between the two countries had vanished, the French Convention anticipated our government by a Declaration of War on the ist of February, 1/93. In the caricatures and political prints of this period we have abundant proofs of the exertions that were made in this country to raise up a hostile feeling against France and the revolution. The majority of those prints are coarse pictures of the sanguinary conduct of the French at home ; of the miseries and atrocities of republicanism ; of the altered condition of England, if French armies or republican propagandism should obtain the mastery. The guillotine, the dagger, the extempore gallows, the pike, and the firebrand were exhibited in luxuriant profusion. In a plate published on the 2 1 st of December," " French liberty " is compared with what the repub- licans of France and the political societies here so often designated as "English slavery:" A jolly son of John Bull, surrounded with provisions and all kinds of comforts, is crying out with the fear of starva- tion and slavery, on one side ; while on the other the hungry, ragged Frenchman is exulting in his own misery. The leaders of the opposition C01IPULSATOBY FEEDING. IMAGINARY DANGERS. 475 in Parliament, who were not daunted by the storm with which they had to contend, became marked objects of popular odium. They were the men who, it was represented, directed the secret weapon which was to strike at the constitution and prosperity of the country. A caricature published on the 1 2th of January, 1793, entitled " Sans-culottes feeding Europe with the bread of liberty," represents the French propagandists by force of arms compelling the various states around them to swallow loaves inscribed with the word " liberty ;" in the middle group Sheridan and Fox, in the characters of sans-culottes, are driving two of these loaves at the point of daggers into the somewhat capacious throat of honest John Bull, who seems far from easy under the infliction. A caricature by Sayer, published on the 15th of December, under the title of " Loyalty against Levelling," re- presents the soldier and the sailor as being at this moment England's only defence against the infectious plague of repub- licanism. The caricatures on the other side of the question, at this time, were few, and seems to have found little encouragement. On the same day, however, which produced the caricature by Sayer, just mentioned, the eccentric Gillray published one in an entirely different spirit. It represents Pitt working upon the terrors of John Bull, who carries in one arm a gun, while the other hand is deposited in his capacious pocket, and whose whole appearance bespeaks an alarm, with the reasons of which he is totally in the dark. That seditious writings had not totall}' seduced him, is evident from the contents of his waistcoat pockets, in one of which is the so much dreaded " Rights of Man," while the other contains one of the loyal pamphlets, entitled " A Pennyworth of Truth ;" his estimate of the danger of cockades is evinced by the simplicity with which he has placed in juxtaposition on his hat the tricolor and the true blue, one inscribed, " Vive la liberte," the other, " God save the King." John Bull and his conductor are placed within a formidable fortification ; the latter is looking through a glass at a flock of geese which are seen scattered over the horizon, but which he has metamorphosed into an army of dan- gerous invaders. The terror of the minister is exhibited in his incoherent exclamations : a burlesque on his speech at the open- ing of parliament, " There, John ! there ! there they are ! I see them ! Get your arms ready, John ! they're rising and coming upon us from all parts ; there ! there's ten thousand pans-culottes now on their passage! and there! look on the other side, the Scotch have caught the itch too ; and the wild A BRACE OF ALARMISTS. JOHN BULL'S ALARM. Irish have began to pull off their breeches ! What will become of us, John ! and see there's five hundred disputing clubs with bloody mouths ! and twenty thousand bill-stickers, with Ca ira pasted in the front of their red caps ! where's the Lord Mayor, John ? Are the b'ons safe ? down with the book-stalls ! blow up the gin-shops ! cut off the printers' ears! O Lord, John ! Lord ! we're all ruined ! they '11 murder us, and make us into aristocrat pies !" John is alarmed because his master is frightened, but his own plain common sense is only half smothered by his fears. " Aristocrat pies ! Lord defend us ! Wounds, measter, you frighten a poor honest simple fellow out of his wits ! gin-shops and printers' ears ! and bloody clubs and Lord Mayors ! and wild Irishmen with- out breeches and sans-culottes ! Lord have mercy upon our wives and daughters ! And yet I'll be shot if I can see anything myself but a few geese gabbling together. But Lord help my silly head, how should such a clod-pole as I be able to see anything right ? I don't know what occasion for I to see at all, for that matter ; why, measter does all that for 1 ; my business is only to fire when and where measter orders, and to pay for the gunpowder. But, measter o' mine, (if I may speak a word,) where's the use of firing now ? What can us two do against all them hundreds of thousands of millions of monsters ? Lord, measter, had we not better try if they wont shake hands with us and be friends ! for if we should go to fighting with them, and they should lather us, what will become of you and I, then, measter!!!" It must be confessed, however, that the French democrats on the other side of the channel, and the demagogues of the clubs on this side, almost daily gave new provocations to justify the conduct of the English government, and the fears which were now spreading universally through English society. It was becoming evident that no country could remain long at peace THE "RIGHTS OF MAN." 477 with the French republic. In the National Convention on the a8th of September, 1 792, on the question of making Savoy into a department of France, Danton declared, amid the loud applauses of the assembly, "The principle of leaving con- quered people and countries the right of choosing their own constitution ought to be so far modified, that we should expressly forbid them to give themselves Kings. There must be no more Kings in Europe. One King icould be sufficient to endanger the general liberty ; and I request that a committee be established for the purpose of promoting a general insurrec- tion among all people against Kings." It was in this spirit that the republican government always made a distinction between the English people and their King and minister ; and showed an inclination to correspond and treat with the people rather than with their governors. It was William Pitt and King George, and their aristocrats, they said, who alone were their enemies ; it was they alone who made war, and the English people were to be appealed to against them. When General Santerre made his farewell address to the National Convention on the i8th of May, 1793, on his departure to act against the royalist insurgents in La Vendee, he concluded with the words, "After the counter-revolutionists shall have been subdued, a hundred thousand men may readily make a descent on England, there to proclaim an appeal to the English people on the present war." Similar doctrines were propagated by the revolutionary societies in England, who corresponded with the democrats of Paris as with brothers, and who, in the latter part of 1792, were exceedingly active. Before his election to the National Convention, Paine published the second part of his " Rights of Man," in which he boldly promulgated principles which were utterly subversive of government and society in this country. This pamphlet was spread through the kingdom with extraordinary industry, and was thrust into the hands of people of all classes. We are told that, as a means of spreading the seditious doctrines it contained, some of the most objec- tionable parts were printed on pieces of paper, which were used by republican tradesmen to wrap their commodities in, and that they were thus employed even in wrapping up sweetmeats for children. Proceedings were immediately taken against its author, who was in Paris, for a libel against the government and constitution, and Paine was found guilty. He was defended with great ability by Erskine, who, when he left the court, was cheered by a crowd of people who had collected without, some of whom took his horses from his carriage, and dragged him 478 TRIAL OF PAINE. home to his house in Serjeants' Inn. The name and opinions of Thomas Paine were at this moment gaining influence, in spite of the exertions made to put them down. In his speech in court, Erskine acknowledged that the voice of the country was against him. The feeling of resistance to re- publican propagandism in England, had, indeed, become universal, and the number of loyal societies formed for the purpose of counteracting sedition, and said to have in many instances received direct encouragement from the government, was in- creased. Of these the most remarkable was the " Society for preserving liberty and property against republicans and levellers," which held its meetings at the Crown and Anchor in the Strand, and which had distributed abroad penny tracts in large numbers. These consisted of popular replies to the insidious doctrines propagated by the disciples of Paine, of encomiums on the excellence and advantages of the British constitution, of narra- tives of the horrible atrocities perpetrated by the republicans in France, and of exhortations to order and obedience. One of the most celebrated and successful of these publications was the tract entitled "Thomas Bull's One penny-worth of Truth, addressed to his brother John." These tracts were often accompanied with loyal and anti-revolutionary songs, such as thr following, which was one of the most popular : "A WORD TO THE WISE. " The Mounseers, they say, have the world in a string, They don't like our nobles, they don't like our King ; But they smuggle our wool, and they'd fain have our wheat, And leave us poor Englishmen nothing to eat. Derry down, &c. " They call us already a province of France, And come here by hundreds to teach us to dance : They say we are heavy, they say we are dull, And that beef and pluin-puddin^'s not good for John Bull. Derry down, &c. " They jaw in their clubs, murder women and priests, And then for their fishwives they make civic feasts ; Civic feasts ! what are they ? why, a new-fashion'd thing, For which they remove both their God and their King. Derry down, &c. " And yet there's no eating, 'tis all foolish play For when pies are cut open, the birds fly away ; And Frenchmen admire it, and fancy they see That Liberty's perch'd at the top of a tree. Derry down, &c. " They say, man and wife should no longer be one, ' Do you take a daughter, and I'll take a son.' LOYAL SONGS. 479 And as all things are equal, and all should be fi-ee, 'If your wife don't suit you, sir, perhaps she'll suit me.' Derry down, &c. " But our women are virtuous, our women are fair, Which is more than, they tell us, your Frenchwomen are ; They know they are happy, they know they are free, And that Liberty's not at the top of the tree. Derry down, &c. " Then let's be united, and know when we're well, Nor believe all the lies these Republicans tell. They take from the rich, but don't give to the poor, And to all sorts of mischief they'd open the door. Derry down, &c. " Our soldiers and sailors will answer these sparks, Though they threaten Dumourier shall spit us like larks ; True Britons don't fear them, for Britons are free, And know Liberty's not to be found on a tree. Derry down, kc, " Ye Britons, be wise, as you're brave and humane, You then will be happy without any Paine. We know of no despots, we've nothing to fear, For this new-fangled nonsense will never do here. Derry down, &c. " Then stand by the Church, and the King, and the Laws ; The old Lion still has his teeth and his claws ; Let Britain still rule in the midst of her waves, And chastise all those foes who dare call her sons slaves. Derry down, &c.** The success of these tracts was so complete, aud the op- position to government so much weakened, that it began to be believed that the year ninety-two would see the end of faction, and that there would be nothing but unity and loyalty in "NINETY-THREE.* " All true honest Britons, I pray you draw near ; Bear a bob in the chorus to hail the new year ; Join the mode of the times, and with heart and voice sing A good old English burden 'tis ' God save the King !' Let the year Ninety-three Commemorated be To time's end ; for so long loyal Britons shall sing, Heart and voice, the good chorus of 'God save the King 1* " See with two different faces old Janus appear, To frown out the old, and smile in the new year ; And thus, while he proves a well-wisher to crowns, On the loyal he smiles, on the factious he frowns. For in famed Ninety-three, Britons all shall agree, With one voice and one heart in a chorus to sing, Drowning faction and party in ' God save the King !' * This song was composed by Charles Dibdin. 4 8o THE POLITICAL STAY-MAKER. " Some praise a new freedom imported from France : Is liberty taught, then, like teaching to dance ? They teach freedom to Britons ! our own right divine ! A rushlight might as well teach the sun how to shine 1 In famed Ninety-three, We'll convince them we're free ! Free from every licentiousness faction can bring ; Free with heart and with voice to sing ' God save the King I* " Thus here, though French fashions may please for a day, As children prize playthings, then throw them away ; In a nation like England they never do hurt ; We improve on the ruffle by adding the shirt I Thus in famed Ninety-three Britons all shall agree, While with one heart and voice in loud chorus they sing, To improve ' Ca ira ' into ' God save the King !' " The same activity in resistance to the invasion of French principles produced a new host of caricatures. These were more personal than the songs and tracts. The trial which had caused very considerable sensation in the country, brought a number of caricatures upon Paine. It had been preceded, on the loth of December, by a fine print by Gillray entitled "Tom Paine's nightly pest," which was so well received that it was published in imitations and pirated copies. The republican stay-maker, and so-called citizen of the world, was represented reposing on his BRITANNIA IN STATS. bed of straw, and dreaming of judges' wigs, and of all sorts of horrors, fears, and punishments. At his bed-head are two FOX SANS-CULOTTIZED. 481 guardian angels, presenting the well-known faces of Fox and Priestley. On the 2nd of January, another caricature, entitled " Fashion for ease ; or, a good constitution sacrificed for a fantastic form," represents Paine fitting Britannia with a new pair of stays. The lady appears to suffer under the operation, and she keeps herself steady by clinging to a ponderous oak. Over the door of a cottage on one side is the sign, " Thomas Paine, stay -maker, from The^ford Paris modes by express." Paine did not venture to return to England, nor did his popu- larity in France last long ; by advocating leniency towards the unfortunate king, he fell under the hatred of the violent party, and was soon after thrown into a dungeon by Robespierre and his associates. In his confinement he composed the most blasphemous of his books, the " Age of Reason." An accident alone saved him from the guillotine; and he sought his last asylum in America, where he lived many years to publish harmless abuse of the laws and institutions of his native country. In the caricatures of the year 1793, Fox and Sheridan are the two extreme leaders of sedition the advocates and companions of Paine pictured literally in the character of sans-culottes. The fallen hopes of the great chief of the opposition had given birth, on the 2nd of January, to a caricature by Gillray, in which Fox, as the despairing Christian, eager for place and not ob- taining it, with his eyes fixed on the glorious paradise of patriots, the Treasury, is sinking into the '' slough of despond." On the ist of March, the same artist pictured him as "a democrat" a veritable sans-culotte in all the perfection of vulgarity of which that character was thought susceptible. This print is said to have given especial offence to Fox. Others represented him in all the different phases of sans-culottism. In one he was a sans- culotte advocate " The solicitor-general for the French Repub- lic" studying the directions for its defence. " ist. Insist we have done everything we ought to have done. and. They have provoked us, neglected, and treated us with scorn. 3rd. How desirous we were of peace, fraternity, and equality : N.B., not to mention our under-hand proceedings. 4th. Soften the massacres. 5th. Abuse our adversaries. 6th. If likely to ter- minate against us, to demur to the matter of form, or move an arrest in judgment." In another, he is represented with his bonnet rouge, and his tricolor cockade, armed cap-a-pie with every instrument of rebellion and destruction, as " The Repub- lican Soldier ;" his " head-quarters, the Crown and Anchor parole, Reform countersign, Anarchy." The result of his efforts was represented in a clever print by Gillray, on the 3otu II 482 THE POLITICAL DENOUNCER. of March, entitled, " Dumourier dining in state at St. James's," dedicated " to the worthy members of the society at the Crown and Anchor." It appears that the liberal party had their meeting also in this tavern. Gillray's print represents the republican general served at table by Fox, Sheridan, and Priestley. The first brings him the head of Pitt in a dish; Sheridan serves him with the crown in a pie; and Priestley offers him the mitre in a tart : all these dishes are garnished with frogs. Other caricatures exult over the fall of Fox's poli- tical power, and the desertions of many of his friends. One of these, published on the 7th of March, represents the two sans- culottes, Fox and Sheridan, discarded scornfully by their old ally, the Prince of Wales, who, a repentant prodigal, is returning to his father's home ; its title is, " False liberty rejected ; or, fraternizing and equalizing principles discarded no more coali- tions no more French cut-throats." The desertion of Burke, and his continued philippics against the French, were no less a subject of exultation ; it was represented that his former asso- ciates were paralysed with fear lest he should divulge their secrets, and denounce their designs. In one of Gillray's carica- tures, dated on the ipth of March, Burke is pictured as the " Chancellor of the Inquisition marking the incorrigibles." On one side is seen the door of the Crown and Anchor, (the haunt of the Anti-Revolutionary Society,) inscribed as the " British Inquisition." Burke, in his new character, is writing the " Black List. Beware of N rf k ! P tl d loves us not ! The E, ss Is will not join us! The man of the people has lived too long for us! The friends of the people must be blasted by us ! Sheridan, Ersk . . . ." Here we trace the hand of the denouncer no further. Fox's private circumstances were, in the meantime, becoming more and more embarrassed, and the great statesman for great statesman he certainly was was reduced to a condition of absolute poverty. He was obliged for a while to resign even the trifling luxuries of life, and it was doubtful if he would not be compelled to retire from public business. His friends, however, interfered, and in the 'summer of 1793, a meeting was held at the Crown and Anchor to take his distressed condition into consideration. The popularity which he still enjoyed was proved by a large subscription, with which an annuity was purchased for him. His enemies laughed at his wants, and mocked the charity by which he was sup- ported, in several caricatures published at the beginning of June. One of these, published- by Gillray on the rathof June, bore the title, " Blue and Buff Charity ; or, the patriarch of the Greek THE' HISTORY OF REFORM, 483 clergy applying for relief." The chairman of the committee for raising a pension for " the champion of liberty," Mr. Sergeant Adair, is doling out to Fox a bundle of unpaid bonds, dis- honoured bills, and other worthless paper ; while the receiver is surrounded by the figures of Earl Stanhope, Dr. Priestley, Home Tooke, and M. A. Taylor. The secretary of the Blue and Buff Charity committee was Mr. Hall, formerly an apothe- cary in Long Acre, known politically by the sobriquet of " Liberty Hall :" he had married the daughter of the eccentric Lord Stanhope, who chose to prove his sincere love of the French principle of equality and fraternity by marrying his child with a plebeian Mr. Hall is represented in the caricature as a ragged personage, with a phial in his pocket containing poison for Pitt. Under all these circumstances, the people influenced by fear on one side and prejudice on the other, the old popular ques- tions of agitation in parliament had no longer any chance of success. Economy, liberty, reform, were hooted as so many synonyms for spoliation, murder, and republicanism. At the beginning of the year, (Jan. 8, 1793,) the history of reform if it were allowed to proceed was represented in a large print in three compartments. First was " Reform advised:" the portly figure of John Bull, seated in the midst of comforts, enjoys his beef and plum pudding, and is only interrupted by three ragged hunters of liberty, who advise him to seek reform. In the second compartment, " Reform begun," John has entered on the path thus pointed out to him, but the prospect is not encou- raging ; he is reduced in his personal appearance, and hobbles forward on a wooden leg ; his three advisers have become victo- rious mob-rovolutionista : they force him, with daggers and clubs, to eat frogs, a diet to which he has evidently some difficulty in accustoming himself. The movement once begun, John has no longer the power to halt : " Reform Compleat " follows, and his three advisers, with the torches of incendiarism blazing in their hands, have thrown him down and are trampling him under their feet. Such were to be the effects of reform, according to the tracts spread abroad by the anti-revolution societies ; and they incul- cated the duty of unbounded gratitude to the minister then at the helm, who had saved them from such disasters, and shielded them against such advisers. In one of Gillray's best carica- tures, published on the 8th of April, Pitt is represented steering the bark of Britannia, in a mean and safe course through the dangers with which it was threatened, on one side by republic- 112 484 CARICATURES ON THE WAR. anism, and on the other by despotism, and making direct for the "haven of public happiness." The print is entitled, " Britannia between Scylla and Charybdis ; or, The vessel of the constitution steered clear of the rock of democracy, and the whirlpool of arbitrary power." The ship is closely followed by three " sharks, dogs of Scylla," presenting the features of Fox, Sheridan, and Priestley. The Reign of Terror which now prevailed in France, was but too vivid a commentary on these exaggerated representations of the dangers of political innovation. Nevertheless, the war in which this country had engaged was far from being popular. It was soon seen that our government had hurried into it without being well prepared for hostilities, and that they carried it on without much skill. A body of English troops, under the Duke of York, had been sent into Flanders to co-operate with our German allies, but proceedings on both sides were for a while guided almost more by accident than by design, and a considerable diversion was made at the beginning of April by the defection of the French commander Dumourier, who left the service of the republic to throw himself into the hands of the Austrians. Gillray, who was in Flanders about this time, represented the " Fatigues of the campaign in Flanders," in May, in a jovial picture of drinking and licen- tr'ousness. Many began to compare the small advantages war was likely to bring us, with its expenses and its evils. On the 3rd of June, Gillray embodied this sentiment in a print in four compartments, representing the various scenes of " John Bull's progress " in war. At first he appears happy and contented at home, in the midst of his family ; then, persuaded that his duty calls him off, he marches away boldly to encounter his enemies ; next, while the war is prolonged abroad, we are introduced to his home, where his family are reduced by distress to carry all their goods to the pawnbroker ; and, lastly, when John returns, ragged and crippled, he finds his family is as great misery as himself. Towards the end of the year, when the allies began to experience reverses, the caricatures, on one side against the war, and on the other against the French, became more nume- rous. Success seemed even to have quitted our old safeguard, the navy, Howe had cruised the seas with an English fleet for some weeks, and was popularly accused of having allowed the French fleet to slip away from him out of Brest Harbour, for which he was severely attacked in several caricatures. The populace believed that French gold alone had saved the repub- lican navy ; and Gillray represented the British Admiral blinded ST. JAN V ARIL'S. 485 by a shower of guineas, in a print, published on the roth of December, and entitled, " A French hail storm ; or, Neptune losing sight of the Brest fleet." On the loth of February, 1794, a still bolder caricature, by the same artist, entitled " Pantagruel's victorious return to the court of Gargantua," ridicules the warlike expedition of the Duke of York. The Duke, returned from his Flemish campaign, brings to his royal father the keys of Paris. The monarch is seated carelessly on his throne, in his hunting garb, to intimate that affairs of state were not his favourite amusement. In a room behind, we per- ceive the Queen carefully hoarding her treasures, and receiving further contributions from the spirit of evil. Pitt is contriving new taxes, " Not to be felt by the swinish multitude." This last phrase, which had been uttered by Burke in his violent declamations against democratic agitation, was long remembered by the popular politicians, and became subsequently a sort of watchword to the ultra-reformers. In the beginning of 1794, France, by immense exertions, had rendered herself a formidable enemy to the rest of Europe, and England at length was seized with the fear of invasion. Within a few months, indeed, the French had invaded, with success, nearly every country that bordered upon the French territory. Howe's victory of the ist of June, came fortunately to support the spirits of Englishmen, who, however, had already become tired of the war. The opposition in parliament now raised their heads with exultation, and accused the ministry of rashness and imbecility. The ministerial party subsidized abroad, and raised soldiers at home, and they affected to laugh at their parliament- ary opponents, as a parcel of quacks, who thought they pos- sessed a nostrum against all the evils with which the country was ever threatened. This nostrum, they said, was Charles Fox, to be applied as prime minister. It was an old superstition among the people of Naples, when their fearful neighbour Vesuvius burst into eruption, to bring forth the head of their patron saint, Januarius, and hold it forth as a safe shield against the danger. Fox was, as it were, the political St. Januarius of the English liberals. A caricature by Gillray, published on the 25th of July, 1794, and entitled, "The eruption of the moun- tain, or the Head of the protector St. Januarius carried in pro- cession by the Cardinal Archeveque of the Lazzaroni," repre- sents the political volcano that was overwhelming and threaten- ing with destruction the nations of the earth, while the head of Fox is brought forth by his followers to stop the course of the danger. The cardinal who officiates is Sheridan ; Lord Lauder- 486 STATE PROSECVTION8. dale carries the book, bell, and candle ; the Duke of Norfolk assists with his earl-marshal's staff; Lord H. Petty and Lord Derby support the cardinal's train ; Lord Stanhope brings up the rear ; and a then well-known general personates a cur which always smelt fire. Encouraged by its strength in parliament, and by the conser- vative spirit that had been spread through the country, the court had proceeded to measures of domestic policy, the wisdom of which might well admit of a doubt. The trial of Thomas Paine was the commencement of a series of state prosecutions, not for political offences, but for political designs. To the name of Paine had been given such unenviable notoriety, and it had caused so much apprehension in the minds of quiet people, that his case excited personally no great sympathy, though many dreaded the extension of the practice of making the pub- lication of a man's abstract opinions criminal, when unaccom- panied with any direct or open attempt to put them into effect. In the beginning of 1/93, followed prosecutions in Edinburgh, where the ministerial influence was great, against men who had associated to do little more than call for reform in Parliament ; and two persons, whose crimes consisted chiefly in having read Paine's " Rights of Man," and in having expressed partial approbation of his doctrines, were transported severally for four- teen and seven years ! These men had been active in the poli- tical societies, and it was imagined that, by an individual injustice of this kind, these societies would be intimidated. Such, however, was not the case, for, from this moment, the clubs in Edinburgh became more violent than ever, and they certainly took a more dangerous character ; so that, before the end of the year, there was actually a " British Convention " sit- ting in the Scottish capital. This was dissolved by force at the beginning of 1794, and two of its members were added to the convicts already destined for transportation. Their severe sentences provoked warm discussions in the English Par- liament, but the ministers were inexorable in their resolution to put them in execution. In the similar prosecutions which they now commenced in England, the Court was less successful. A bookseller of London, who had published a pamphlet of a demo- cratic tendency, entitled " Politics for the People ; or, Hog's- wash," and some violent democrats of Manchester, for an alleged conspiracy, were all acquitted by the juries which tried them ; and in the latter case one of the government witnesses was sub- sequently convicted of perjury, and sentenced to the pillory. The public agitation was much increased by these prosecutions, AGHATION AND RIOT. 487 and many parts of the country became the scene of serious riots ; for there was always a mob for the prosecuted, and there was in general also a loyal mob a mob for the prosecutors. This latter, in several instances, committed great outrages on the property of individiials. The illuminations in London, on the occasion of Lord Howe's victory, were attended with con- siderable uproar, and attacks were made on the houses of some of the so-called revolutionists. It was generally believed that these attacks were made under direct incitement from persons of higher rank in society than those who engaged in them. The next day, the uu-aristocratic and more than eccentric Lord Stanhope inserted the following advertisement in the news- papers : "OUTRAGE IN MANSFIELD STREET. " Whereas an hired band of ruffians attacked my house in Mansfield Street, in the dead of the night, between the i ith and izth of June instant, and set it on fire at different times ; and whereas a gentleman's carriage passed several times to and fro in front of my house, and the aristocrat, or other person who was in the said carriage, gave money to the people in the street, to encourage tbem ; this is to request the Friends of Liberty and Good Order to send me any authentic information they can procure, re- specting the names and place of abode of the said aristocrat, or other person, who was in the carriage above-mentioned, in order that he may be made amenable to the law. " STANHOPE." Earl Stanhope, the " sans-culotte peer," figures in a multitude of cari- catures, during this and subsequent years. In the one from which the accompanying cut is taken, published on the 3rd of May, 1794, he is re- presented as the fool of the opposi- tion, holding for his bauble a standard with the inscription, " Vive egalite!" throwing away his breeches as a garment inconsistent with his sans- culottism, and trampling on his coronet. The print gives him the title of "The noble sans-culotte," and is accompanied with " a ballad occasioned by a certain earl's styling himself a sans-culotte citizen in the House of Lords." A 6ANS-CCLOTTE NODLM. " Rank, character, distinction, fame, And noble birth, forgot, Hear Stanhope, modest Earl, proclaim Himself a sans culotte. 488 ATTACK ON TEE POLITICAL SOCIETIES. " Of pomp And splendid circumstance The vanity he teaches ; And spurns, like citizen of France, Both coronet and breeches." Lords Stanhope and Lauderdale were coupled together as the two advocates of extreme democratic principles in the House of Lords. In the month of May, the government made a direct attack on two of the most violent and powerful of the London societies the Corresponding Society and the Society for Constitutional Information. Some of their principal members, including the Rev. Jeremiah Joyce, (Lord Stanhope's private secretary,) Home Tooke, the afterwards celebrated political lecturer John Thelwall, Thomas Hardy, Daniel Adams, and three or four others, were arrested and thrown into the Tower on a charge of high-treason. The papers of the societies were seized, and laid by a royal message before parliament, and, on a very vague report of their contents, the ministers succeeded by their over- whelming majorities in carrying hurriedly that extreme measure under imminent danger, the suspension of the habeas corpus act. All this violence tended on the one hand to destroy public confidence, by disturbing the country with unnecessary terrors, while on the other it was hastening a reaction of the public mind against the temper into which it had been urged by con- servative agitation. The state trials |ook place in the months of October, Novem- ler, and December, and were the cause of very great excitement. The courts were crowded to excess, and mobs assembled out of doors. Hardy, who had been secretary of the Corresponding Society, was first brought to trial, which, after lasting eight days, ended on the ^th of November in an acquittal by the jury. The evidence amounted to nothing more than charging him with holding certain principles, which he had done in no manner that was absolutely illegal; and, as it appeared, the papers of the society, on which so much stress had been laid, contained nothing that had not before been printed in the newspapers. Home Tooke was next acquitted, on the 22nd of November; and the same fate attended all the other prosecutions. The Court, mortified at this check, relinquished some other similar proceedings which it had already commenced, and certainly gained no popu- larity by what it had done. Many, who were personally hostile to the opinions of the men prosecuted, rejoiced with others at their escape, and exulted in the courage and probity of English juries. The mob carried the prisoners and their legal defenders CHANGES IN THE MINISTRY. 489 home from the court in triumph. The chief advocate in the defence in these state prosecutions, was Erskine. In the course of these unwise proceedings, the ministry had received strength from a modification in its ranks, and the ad- mission of some of the more moderate of the old Whig party, who had separated from the Foxites at the same time and on the same grounds with Burke. In July, 1794, the Duke of Port- land was made third secretary of state ; Earl Fitzwilliam presi- dent of the council; Earl Spencer received the office of lord privy seal ; and Mr. Windham was made secretary at war. In December following, the ministry underwent some other slight modifications, the chief of which arose from the appointment of Ea;l Fitzwilliam to the office of Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and of Earl Spencer to oe first lord of the Admiralty, in place of Pitt's elder brother, the Earl of Chatham, who took the privy seal in exchange. 49 CHAPTER XIII GEORGE III. Clamours for Peace Marriage of the Prince of Wales Popular Subjects of Complaint ; Taxes and Reform Insult upon the King Bill against Seditious Meetings Great Meeting in Copenhagen Fields Unsuccess- ful Negotiations for Peace New Agitation against France and Repub- licanism Wine and Dog Tax Threatened Invasion Irish Rebellion Naval Victories ; Battle of the Nile Union with Ireland Bonaparte First Consul. THE violent and unnatural agitation of the country towards extreme Toryism was now giving way to a gradual re- action, and with the year 1795 the opposition began for a moment to raise its head again. This was first shewn in the increased clamour for peace. Even some of those who sat on the ministerial benches, such as Wilberforce, expressed their dis- satisfaction at the warlike tone in which the session was opened, and at the want of any expression of a pacificatory tendency in the speech from the Throne. The ministers, in defending themselves, spoke of making peace or alliance with a govern- ment like that of France as a thing to which England could hardly condescend ; they said that no such peace could be lasting, and they held up again the bugbear of republican propa- gandism. During the spring, motion after motion was made in the House of Lords, as well as in the House of Commons, to force upon the attention of. the Court the necessity of negotia- ting with our enemies on the other side of the water. The leaders of the opposition lost no opportunity of agitating the question ; and petitions against the war began to flow in from different parts of the country. The Court had recourse to the old stratagem of exciting popular teiTor, and throwing discredit on the motives of the " patriots." Most of the old leaders of actual sedition had dis- appeared from the scene in one manner or other; even Dr. Priestley had now migrated to America ; but Fox and Sheridan still fought their old battle in the House of Commons; and they found able supporters among the young statesmen who were coming forward in the political world. The ministers represented that these men were betraying the interests of their CLAMOURS FOB PEACH. 49 * country to France, out of a blind admiration of its republican institutions, and that it was the wish to see those institutions established at home which led them to advocate peace. A cari- cature by Gillray, published on the 26th of January 1791; pic- tures Fox as a "French telegraph making signals in the dark," and pointing out to our enemies the way into our own stronghold. Another, by the same artist, published on the 2nd of February, was entitled, " The Genius of France triumphant, or Britannia petitioning for peace ;" and represented Britannia offering her crown, sceptre, spear, shield, and liberties, at the foot of a sans-culotte monster, crowned with the guillotine, and resting its feet on the sun and moon. Behind her come Sheridan, bringing for his offering to this new object of worship the English navy, Fox, with the bank, and Lord Stan- hope, bringing for his sacrifice the English Parliament. On the 2nd of March, Gillray depicted the conse- quences which we were to expect from thus truckling to our enemies, in a large plate, entitled " Patriotic Regeneration, or, Parliament reformed a la Fran$aise." In this " reformed" Parliament, Pitt is brought up as a culprit before the bar of the House, with Stanhope as public accuser, and Lord Lauderdale as executioner. Fox presides, with Sheridan as secretary, and Erskine as attorney-general. The body of the picture presents a wholesale scene of plunder and confusion. The three Whig lords, Grafton, Norfolk, and Derby, are burning Magna Charta and the Bible ; and Lord Shelburne, who had long left the Tory camp, is weighing the cap of liberty against the crown. Pitt's own caricaturist, Sayer, published on the i4th of April a series of what he entitled " Outlines of the Opposition in 1795, collected from the works of the most capital Jacobin artists." In the first of these prints, Wilberforce is represented in the character of a weathercock, blown round by the breath of repub- licanism till he stretches out his arms to " peace and fraternity with France," the dove bringing the olive-branch in its beak and the dagger in its claw. The next represents Whitbread, under the character of a barrel of his own beer, bursting and AN OBJECT OF WORSHIP. 49* " OUTLINES OF THE OPPOSITION." driving out the members of the House by its stink ; in the fumes which issue from it we re.-vl the words " Reform," "Peace," "Liberty," "Equality," "No slave trade." The speaker, with averted head, is calling to order. In another, Lord Stanhope is formed into a vessel, urged on by the monster of republicanism, but sailing against the "current of public opinion" and the breeze of "lovalty ;" it is entitled "The Stan- hope republican gunboat, constructed to sail againstwindand tide." A fourth plate is entitled " The Bedford Level," and is aimed against the Duke of Bedford, now one of the most energetic opponents of the ministry, and who, on the 2/th of January, had brought forward a motion in the House of Lords for nego- tiations for peace. At the entrance to Bedford House, a builder's level, inscribed "Liberty and Equality," is supported on the heads of a jockey seated on a saddle, and a sans-culotte seated on a pile of bags of money and a bundle of " title-deeds of estates in ." Each figure wears the tricoloured cockade ; and the latter of the two alludes to the liberality with which the duke expended his money iu the " good cause." The next caricature of this series, entitled " A recruit for opposition from the Temple of British Worthies," represents Fox and Lord Derby enlisting the Duke of Buckingham. The diminutive Earl of Derby, mounted on a table, is measuring the Duke's height by the " standard of opposition;" Fox's flag is inscribed " Watchword, Peace ;" the Duke shows Fox his terms, " Condi- tion, to be first Lord of the Admiralty," and says, " To Pitt I made my proposition, But he rejected the condition, So I enlist with Opposition." The last of these plates is a ludicrous burlesque on the appre- hension held out by the opposition that the French might be brought over to invade us in Dutch bottoms ; the leaders, Fox, Sheridan, Lords Stanhope and Lansdowne, and Watson, Bishop of Landaff, are admiring the fine phantasmagoric effect produced by this contrivance. Two caricatures by Gillray, which appeared at this period, in- volve bitter attacks on the opposition " patriots." The political and religious excitement of the time, with the wonderful events that were passing every day before people's eyes, led some per- sons into bold and extraordinary hallucinations, and drove others stark mad. When the pulpit of the more sober preachers of the gospel often resounded with denunciations in general terms of the designs of providence, as evinced in the dreadful storm that was MARRIAGE OF THE PRINCE OF WALES. 493 now breaking over Europe, and they explained by them the un- fulfilled prophecies of Scripture, we need not be surprised if there were others who believed themselves endowed with the spirit of prophecy, and who undertook to make known more fully the events of the coming age. Among these, one of the most remarkable was an insane lieutenant of the navy, named Eichard Brothers, who declared that he was the " nephew of God," and that he had a divine mission, and boasted that he was unassailable by any human power. He announced that London was on the eve of being swallowed up and totally destroyed, and that immediately afterwards the Jews were to be gathered together into the promised land. It is extra- ordinary that an enthusiast like this should have been able to work upon the superstitious feelings of the populace so as to make him an object of apprehension to government ; but it is said he was believed to have become the tool of faction, and that he was employed to seduce the people and to spread fears and alarms. On the 4th of March he was arrested by two King's messengers and their assistants, and placed under restraint, though they had some difficulty in keeping off the mob, who attempted to rescue him. The next day Gillray published the first of the caricatures just alluded to, under the title of " The Prophet of the Hebrews ;" but the Jews here carried to the land of promise are the leaders of the opposition in Parliament, who are borne away by the genius of revolution towards a fiery gallows that blazes in the distance. In the other caricature, published on the 3oth of April, under the title of " Light expel- ling Darkness," Pitt appears drawn in glory by the liou and the unicorn, harnessed to a triumphal car, and trampling down or scattering before them the leaders of the opposition. Another royal union came this year to relieve the monotony of the usual subjects of political agitation, and this was a marriage which affected still more the interests of the country, that of the heir-apparent, the Prince of Wales. The prince appears to have been as much terrified as the people by the alarm-cry of the ministry, and he had for some time discontinued his support of the opposition in Parliament. The extravagance of his private life, however, had undergone no change, and he was again deeply involved in debt. It was under these circumstances that he was induced to marry the Princess Caroline of Brunswick, and the marriage ceremonies were performed by the Archbishop of Canterbury on the 8th of April. The Tories hoped that this marriage, which was understood to have been a favourite measure with the King, would entirely estrange the prince from his 494 TAX UPON HAIR-POWDER. Whig connexions, which they always pretended to be the sole cause of his private irregularities. A fine print by Gillray, published a few days before the marriage, and entitled " The Lover's Dream," embodied these sentiments : on one side of the Prince's bed, Fox and Sheridan, his evil genii, are vanishing in darkness before the bright vision of beauty which bursts forth on the other side. The hopes which everybody placed in this union were sung about in joyful ballads, and exhibited with no less gladness in the windows of the print-shops. Yet its only result at the moment was a new application to Parliament for the payment of the prince's debts, and it eventually ended in domestic unhappiness and public scandal. The two questions on which, after that of peace, the country was most agitated, were those of the increase of taxation and parliamentary reform. The necessarily great expenditure of the war, made greater by the utter want of economy shewn every- where in the application of public money, and the extraordinary subsidies given to foreign governments to support them in their exertions against France, were now driving the minister to every kind of expedient to raise money. Taxes were levied upon articles which no one ever thought of taxing before. The most remarkable tax of this kind, granted by Parliament in the session of 1795, was the tax upon persons wearing hair-powder, a fashion which was then universal among all who laid claim to respectability in society. This tax could hardly be complained of as a serious burden, or even as a grievance ; but it was chiefly remarkable for the extraordinary mistake which the minister committed in boasting of the great addition which it was to bring to the revenue ; for the use of hair-powder was almost immediately discontinued, and the produce of the tax was hardly worth the trouble of collecting it. It became at first a party distinction ; the Whigs wore their hair cut short behind, and without powder, which was termed wearing the hair d, la guil- lotine; while the Tories, who continued the use of the hair- powder, were called guinea-pigs, because one guinea was the amount per head of the tax. The hair-powder tax was the subject of many songs and jeux-d 'esprit, as well as of several caricatures, which, from this time to the end of the century, became so numerous that they form a regular history of every event that agitated society, even in a trifling degree. The larger portion of the caricatures of the period alluded to were from the talented pencil and graver of Gillray, and are much superior to those of the preceding or following periods. The hair-powder tax was brought forward by Pitt on the 23rd of February ; on POPULAR DISCONTENT. 495 the loth of March, Gillray published a caricature under the title of "Leaving off Powder; or, a frugal family saving a guinea." An anonymous caricature, published on the ijth of June, represents Pitt under the character of "a guinea-pig," and Fox as " a pig without a guinea." On the ist of June the artist just mentioned, in a caricature entitled " John Bull ground down," had represented Pitt grinding John Bull into money, which was flowing out in an immense stream beneath the mill. The Prince of Wales is drawing off a large portion to pay the debts incurred by his extravagance, while Dundas, Burke, and Loughborough, as the representatives of ministerial pensioners, are scrambling for the rest. King George encourages Pitt to grind without mercy. Another caricature by Gillray, published on the 4th of June, represents Pitt as Death on the white horse (the horse of Hanover) riding over a drove of pigs, the repre- sentatives of what Burke had rather hastily termed the " swinish multitude." In a caricature, published on the 1 2th of June, under the title of " Blind Man's Buff; or, too many for John Bull," the minister is represented setting all the foreign powers on poor John to drain him of his money. A caricature on the different progressive stages of government, as exemplified in different countries, published on the ist of September, represents it first as " The State Caterpillar," its rings composed of high offices, pensions, and other sources of extravagant expenditure, devouring England, Scotland, and Ireland, which are spread before it in the form of a cabbage-leaf ; next it is represented in Holland, in its transition state, as a chrysalis ; and lastly as a glorious butterfly in republican France. This allegory represented the sentiments then held by many on the progressive developments of the civil government, as the people advanced from despotism to liberty. The popular discontent was increased by the great scarcity, and consequent dear ness of provisions, which began to be felt at the beginning of summer, and in creased to an alarming degree during the autumn. From this cause, and from grievances connected with recruiting and press-gangs, there was much rioting throughout the country. Considerable uneasiness was caused at Birmingham and other places in that part of England in the month of June, by mobs demanding " cheap bread," which led in some cases to collisions with the military. Similar disturbances took place in London, and the feeling of dissatisfac- tion extended all over the country. The government appears to have taken no effectual measures against the increasing distress ; they merely recommended various expedients to lessen the 496 BILLY THE BUTCHER. consumption of bread, by employing other substances, and a bill was passed to prevent, for a period, distillation from grain ; but the attention of Parliament was chiefly occupied with providing for the Prince of Wales. Pitt was said to have made the singular suggestion that people should eat meat to save bread ; and a caricature, published on the 6th of July, represents the minister as the " British butcher," serving John Bull with dear meat to stop his cry for cheap bread. Beneath him is the epigram, " Bitty the Butcher's advice to John Bull. " Since bread is so dear (and you say you must eat), For to save the expense you must live upon meat ; And as twelvepence the quartern you can't pay for bread, Get a crown's worth of meat, it will serve in its stead." As winter approached, the agitation became still greater, and the numerous demagogues who addressed themselves to the populace and lower orders, took advantage of the general discontent to spread abroad their se- ditious opinions. A nu- merous meeting had been held in St. George's Fields in June to petition for annual parliaments and universal suffrage. This sort of agitation went on increasing, and the London Correspond- ing Society called a meet- ing on the 26th of October in Copenhagen Fields, where an immense multi- F- - sS^ffpSST tude assembled to vote -^3 jlpi^ and sign addresses and ~^T '* remonstrances on the state of the country. Three AN ORATOR. wooden scaffolds were raised in different parts of the field, from which three of the orators of the populace addressed the assemblage in inflammatory language, which no doubt contributed towards urging them to the disgraceful outrage which followed three days later. The most active ATTACK ON THE KISG. 497 speaker was Thelwall, who had just escaped from prison.* The opening of parliament was looked forward to with great anxiety. It was called together early, on account of the extreme distress under which the country was labouring. As the time approached, popular meetings were held in the metropolis, and preparations were made for an imposing demonstration of mob force. During the morning of the 2pth of October, the day on which the King was to open the session in person, crowds of men continued pouring into the town from the various open spaces outside, where simultaneous meetings had been called by placards and advertisements, and before the King left Buckingham House, on his way to St. James's, the number of people collected on the ground over which he had to pass is said in the papers of the day to have been not less than two hundred thousand. At first the state-carriage was allowed to move on through this dense mass in sullen silence, no hats being taken off, or any other mark of respect being shewn. This was followed by a general outburst of hisses and groans, mingled with shouts of " Give us peace and bread !" " No war !" " No King !" " Down with him ! down with George!" and the like; and this tumult continued unabated until the King reached the House of Lords, the Guards with difficulty keeping the mob from closing on the carriage. As it passed through Margaret Street the populace seemed determined to attack it, and when opposite the Ordnance Office, a shot of some kind, supposed to be a bullet from an air-gun, passed through the glass of the carriage window. The tumult was, if anything, more outrageous on the King's return, and he had some difficulty in reaching St. James's Palace without injury ; for the mob threw stones at the state- carriage and damaged it considerably. After remaining a short time at St. James's, he proceeded in his private coach to Buckingham House, but the carriage was stopped in the park by the populace, who pressed round it, shouting, " Bread ! bread! peace! peace!" until the King was rescued from this unpleasant situation by a strong body of the Guards. The Lords were much agitated at this gross insult offered to the royal person, and were some time before they could calm themselves sufficiently to proceed to business. The Tories made a new cry against the spread of revolutionary principles, and the dangerous designs of seditious men ; and they said that * A caricatured picture of this celebrated meeting, was published on the i6th of November, under the title of "Copenhagen House." The cut given in the preceding page is taken from this print, and is understood to represent Thelwall addressing the mob. K 498 INCREASING AGITATION. it was the opposition shewn to ministers in parliament that encouraged the mob out of doors. Gillray gave to the public a caricature on the ist of November, in which the attack upon the King was travestied, and each of the opposition leaders had his place in the scuffle. Pitt is seated on the box, as royal coachman ; and Lords Loughborough and Grenville, Dundas, and Sir Pepper Arden hold on behind as footmen. The Duke of Norfolk presents the blunderbuss at royalty; Fox and Sheridan are bludgeon-men ; and Lords Stanhope and Lau- derdale and another old patriot are holding the wheels of the carriage to stop its progress. The ministers took advantage of this riot to bring forward new bills for the defence of his Majesty's person, and to prevent assemblies of an inflammatory character, where papers were circulated and speeches made calculated to irritate the minds of his Majesty's subjects against his person and govern- ment. This measure met with the most violent opposition, and it was extremely unpopular throughout the country. People said that there were already laws enough for the protection of the crown, without any further infringement of the liberty of the subject ; they beheld the government forming itself into a sort of inquisition, from the eyes of which no one would be safe ; and they augured that King George and William Pitt were goading and irritating the people, until they would produce that very revolution of which they professed to entertain such profound fears. The political clubs throughout the kingdom began immediately to agitate against Pitt's new bill ; and the London Corresponding Society called another public meet- ing. Pitt is said to have shewn the greatest symptoms of alarm on this occasion. His temerity in provoking John Bull by so many coercive measures was satirised on the 2ist of November, in a caricature entitled, " The Royal Bull-fight," in which Pitt, on the white horse (the emblem of the house of Hanover,) is encountering the British Bull ; the inscription is a parody on the account of a Spanish bull-fight "Then entered a bull of the true British breed, who appeared to be extremely peaceable till opposed by a desperado mounted upon a white horse, who, by numberless wounds, provoked the animal to the utmost pitch of fury, when collecting all its strength into one dreadful effort, and darting upon its opponent, it destroyed both horse and rider in a moment." Such, it was foretold, would be the fate of King George (the white horse of Hanover), and his rider Pitt, if they urged John Bull too far. Another caricature which appeared on the a6th of November, PITT AND HIS BOTTLE. 499 represents Fox and Sheridan, whose opposition to the bill against popular meetings had been very galling to the minister, tarring and feathering Pitt, their tar being "the rights of the people," made to boil over by a fire the fuel of which was " the sedition bill," " ministerial influence," and " infor- mations." The system of spies and informers was now being organised on a very extensive plan. A caricature, published on the ist of December, one of the earlier works of this class by Isaac Cruikshank, represents Pitt as " the royal extinguisher," putting out the flame of sedition. Amid the scarcity of provisions under which people were suffering, a caricature, pub- lished on the 24th of December, took revenge upon the minister for the former joke of making meat a substitute for bread, and represents him and his party feeding voraciously on English gold as a still better substitute. Caricatures, and other satirical productions, attacked Pitb severely for his apparent neglect, or want of foresight, in not making some better provision against the visitation of famine. The premier was addicted somewhat immoderately to the bottle, and he, as well as his great opponent, Fox, is said to have taken his place in the House of Commons more than once in a state of absolute intoxication. We are frequently re- minded of this failing in the caricatures of the period of which we are now speaking. When the scarcity of 179,5 was just begin- ning, a print, published by Gillray on the 27th of May, represents one of the jovial scenes at Pitt's country house, at Wimbleton, between the minister and his friend Dundas, who was as great a drinker as himself. It is entitled, " God save the King ! in a bumper ; or, An Evening Scene three times a-week, at Wimbleton." Pitt is attempting to fill his glass from the wrong end of the bottle, while his companion, grasping pipe and bumper, ejaculates the words,' "Billy, my boy all my joy!" Another caricature by Gillray, pub- lished on the pth of November, represents the supposed " fatal effects of French defeat," upon the intelligence of an unexpected success gained by the allies ; these effects are "hanging" and " drowninj KK a A MINISTKU TV HTOH GI.Efc 5oo BACCHUS AND JOHN HULL. the former is supposed to be literal in the ease of Fox, who was always represented by the Tories as the friend of republican France ; but Pitt and Dundas are drowning in wine, the effects of which are only fatal so far as to lay them helpless on the floor. Among the new taxes brought forward in the spring of 1796, was an additional duty of twenty pounds per butt on wine, which provoked no little discontent ; and the minister's wine- bibbing propensity furnished the subject of aqundance of satire. Orillray represented him under the character of Bacchus, and his friend Dundas under that of Silenus, in a caricature published on the aoth of April, 1 796, with the title of "The Wine Duty; or, the Triumph of Bacchus and Silenus." John Bull, with empty bottle and empty purse, and a very long face, addresses his remonstrance : " Pray, Mr. Bacchus, have a bit of consideration for old John ; you know as how I've emptied my purse already for you ; and it 's waundedly hard to raise the price of a drop of comfort, now that one's got no money left for to pay for it !" The ministerial Bacchus, from his pipe of wine (which is sup- ported on the " treasury bench,") hiccups forth his reply : " Twenty pounds a t-tun addi- tional duty, i-i-if you d-d-dont like it at that,w hy, t-t-t-then dad and I will keep it all for o-o-our own drinking, so here g-g-goes, old Bu-bu-bull and mouth!" The bibacious qualifications of the patriots were, however, no less cele- brated than those of the ministers, and were in their turn brought forward as subjects of satire or of joke. Fox and Sheridan were notorious drinkers ; and the former is said to have been some- times brought from the tavern late at night to the House, on an extraordi- nary emergency, in such a condition that he required a long BACCHUS AND SILENUS. A BRANDT-DRINKER. JUSTICE MIDAS. 501 application of wet towels to his head before he was able to go to his place and speak. In a caricature by Gillray, published on the ^th of February, 1797, representing one of the private par- ties of the Whig leaders, here described ironically as " the feast of reason and the flow of soul," Sheridan, not satisfied with drinking wine, like his companions, is filling his bumper with brandy. The additional wine-tax furnished subjects for other carica- tures besides that by Gillray. In one, published on the 2^th of April, and entitled " The Triumph of Bacchus ; or, a Consulta- tion on the additional wine-duty," Pitt is represented as Justice Midas, sitting on the wine-barrel, drinking and smoking. Dundas sits on one side, on a tub, occupied in the same manner, and exclaims, " Who dare oppose wise Justice Midas ?" On the other side stands the Duchess of Gordon, Pitt's great political supporter among the ladies. She is dressed in a remarkable transparent vest, leans against a barrel, and she also drinks, while she exclaims, " Oh, what a God is Justice Midas ! oh, the tremendous Justice Midas !" Another tax, now laid for the first time, which excited both discontent and ridicule, was that upon dogs. The debates on this tax in the House of Commons appear to have been extremely amusing. In opposing the motion to go into com- mittee, Sheridan objected that the bill was most curiously worded, as it was in the first instance entitled " A bill for the protection of his Majesty's subjects against dogs :" " from these words," he said, "one would imagine that dogs had been guilty of burglary, though he believed they were a better pro- tection to their master's property than watchmen." After having entertained the house with some stories about mad dogs, and giving a discourse upon dogs in general, he asked, " since there was an exception in favour of puppies, at what age they were to be taxed, and how the exact age was to be ascertained." The secretary at war, who spoke against the bill, said, "it would be wrong to destroy in the poor that virtuous feeling which they had for their dog." In committee Mr. Lechmere called the attention of the house to ladies' lap-dogs : " he knew a lady who had sixteen lap-dogs, and who allowed them a roast shoulder of veal every day for dinner, while many poor persons were starving was it not therefore right to tax lap-dogs very high ? He knew another lady who kept one favourite dog, when well, on Savoy biscuits soaked in Burgundy, and when ailing, (by the advice of a doctor,) on minced chicken and sweet- bread!" Among the caik'atures on this subject, one by Gillray THE SLOOMSSUSY FARMEE. (of which there were imitations) represented Fox and his friends, hanged upon a gallows, as " dogs not worth a tax," while the supporters of government, among whom is Burke with " Gr. B." on his collar, are ranged as well-fed dogs, " paid for." The ministers carried their bill to prevent seditious meetings through every stage by large majorities ; but in the course of the debates, the most unconstitutional publication that turned up, was a pamphlet, entitled " Thoughts on the English Govern- ment," by a Mr. Reeves, an active member of one of the anti- . revolutionary societies, in which it was stated that "The monarchy of England was like a goodly tree, of which the Lords and Commons were merely branches; that they might be lopped off, and that the constitution of England might still go on without their aid." The whole pamphlet was read before the House of Commons, and excited considerable warmth ; but, after several debates, the author was sent from the tribunal of the House to a court of justice, in which he was prosecuted for a libel on the constitution ; but he was acquitted by the jury on the ground that his motives were not such as were laid in the information, though the jury condemned the pamphlet as " a very improper publication." The ministers were, at the same time, mortified at having their prosecutions for sedition or treason defeated by the juries, who, in almost every instance, gave a verdict of " not guilty." The societies were not destroyed, as was expected, by the government bill ; on the contrary, they were encouraged by the support of some of the richer and more powerful members of the parliamentary opposition, especially of the Duke of Bedford, who now stood foremost in its ranks, and was liberally expending his money in the cause of freedom, which was certainly threatened by the ministerial measures. Gillray, on the 3rd of February, made the manner in which the patriotic duke expended his money a subject of satire in a cari- cature, entitled " The Generse of Patriotism, or the Bloomsbury Farmer planting Bedfordshire Wheat." The duke is represented sowing his gold on land ploughed by Sheridan. Fox, as the sun, smiling roguishly from his orb, warms the seeds into pro- ductiveness, and they spring up behind the sower in a numerous crop of French bonnets-rouges and Jacobin daggers. In the middle of February Mr. Grey again introduced a motion for peace, which was supported by the opposition, and replied to with much less warmth than formerly, and the minister acknow- ledged that the government was not averse to seize an oppor- tunity of negotiating. The face of Europe had indeed changed A DISSOLUTION. 503 considerab'y within a few months. On one side, our allies, in spite of 1-he extraordinary sums expended in subsidies, were becoming faint and falling off before the immense armies of the republic ; and, on the other, the republic itself, since the over- throw of the Jacobin party, seemed to be changing its character from a democracy to a despotic oligarchy. The fear of propa- gandism appeared, therefore, to have vanished, while it left us to the prospect of contending single-handed against so powerful an adversary. In this position of affairs, the English parliament was dissolved in the latter part of May, and another was elected equally subservient to the will of the minister. On the 2ist of May, the day after the Parliament was prorogued, Gillray pro- duced a caricature, entitled " The Dissolution, or the Alchymist producing an aethereal Representation," in which Pitt appears with an immense retort, distilling the old House of Commons into a new one, the members of which fall down worshipping at his feet. He heats the fire of his furnace, by which this trans- mutation is produced, with bright gold coin, which is described as "treasury coals." When the new Parliament met on the 6th of October, the speech from the throne announced that steps had been taken which had opened the way for a direct negotiation for a Euro- pean peace, and that an ambassador would be immediately sent to Paris with full powers to treat. It was intimated, moreover, that the wish for negotiation was hastened by the declared intention of France to attempt an invasion of this island. Lord Malmesbury was accordingly sent to Paris to open nego- tiations, and arrived there on the 22nd of October. The lower orders in France seem to have rejoiced at the prospect of peace, and they exhibited their feelings somewhat tumultuously in the welcome they gave to the ambassador as he passed through the provincial towns ; but the Directory, after amusing him with pretended negotiations, and then treating him in a haughty and insulting manner, gave him a peremptory order to leave Paris on the ipth of December, and thus destroyed all hope of ob- taining peace, under any circumstances, from the government which now ruled France, and which had imbibed too deeply the thirst for conquest and plunder, and possessed an immense army which it would have been dangerous to recall. England was thus plunged deeper than ever into the war, and, feeling that its only safety lay in conquering, entered upon it with more resolu- tion and unanimity than ever. The negotiation, perhaps, arose from a sudden misgiving on the part of the minister, for it seems never to have been fully 504 CARICATURES AGAINST PEACE. approved of by his own party, and its expediency appears to have been very generally doubted. Burke had been the first to protest against it, in his two eloquent " Letters on a Regicide Peace," published in the course of the summer.* Earl Fitz- william entered a protest against it in the journals of the House of Lords, on occasion of the debate on the address. Burke's letters had produced a great sensation, and they were backed by some bold and spirited caricatures as the period for negotiating approached. A large print by Sayer, dated the i4th of October, but said to have been never finished for publication, is entitled " Thoughts on a Regicide Peace," and represents Burke dream- ing of the dangers with which his country was threatened. In the frightful vision, republican France is dictating its own terms, while Britannia is practising a French tune, which her lion accompanies with a dismal howl. Gillray's caricature, dated the 2oth of October (two days before our ambassador's arrival in Paris), and entitled, " Promised horrors of the French inva- sion ; or, forcible reasons for negotiating a Regicide Peace," was published, and exhibits a terrific picture of what was to be expected if the French revolutionized England (for the French government still patronized democracy in the countries they wished to conquer) and made the Foxite reformers masters of the crown and constitution. In the foreground, Pitt is bound to a post, and is scourged by Fox, between whose legs M. A. Taylor struts in the form of a crowing bantam-cock perched on the handle of the bloody axe. The Duke of Bedford, as a bull, urged on by the mob orator Thelwall, is tossing Burke into the air. Lord Stanhope is weighing the head of Lord Grenville against the ministerial weight of the broad bottom. Erskine, to whom Lord Lansdowne is offering the Lord Chancellor's wig, is employed in burning Magna Charta. Jenkinson and Canning are hanged on the lamps. The princes are assassinated, and their bodies thrown from the windows of Brooks's. A compli- cated scene of murder and plunder fills the whole picture, in the back-ground of which we perceive the Palace of St. James's enveloped in flames. The failure of our negotiations had this advantage, that it kindled throughout the island a flame of patriotic enthusiasm, and a determination to resent to the utmost the threat of inva- sion. In the midst of such feelings, it is not surprising if the alarming budget which the minister was obliged to announce in the beginning of the session was allowed to pass with less abso- * This publication was one of the last of Edmund Burke's political acts. He died on the gth of July, 1 797. JOHN BULL IN A PANIC. 505 lute discontent than usual; and that even a voluntary loan, which. . the government was obliged to open, was filled up with extraordinary rapidity. On the i7th of November, Gillray published a caricature entitled the " Opening of the Budget ; or, John Bull giving his breeches to save his bacon." Pitt, with a large bag inscribed as the "requisition budget" open before him, is obliged to excite John Bull's apprehensions in order to extract his money from his pocket ; he exclaims, " More money, John ! more money ! to defend you from the bloody, the cannibal French they're a coming ! why, they'll strip you to the very skin ! more money, John ! they're a coming they're a coming!" The money was not all expended against French invaders, for Burke, Portland, and Dundas, as representatives of the host of pensioners, are seen behind the bag scrambling for the gold, and seconding Pitt's exhortations with their several assertions " Ay, they're a coming ! " " Yes, yes, they're a coming!" "Ay, ay, they're a coming they're a coming!" John Bull, in his alarm at the report of invasion and his distrust of the professed patriots, throws money and breeches and all into the bag, with the sullen declaration, " A coming ! are they ? Nay, then, take all I've got at once, Measter Billy ! vor it's much better for I to ge ye all I have in the world to save my bacon, than to stay and be strip'd stark naked by Charley and the plundering French invasioners, as you say ! " Charley (Fox) is seen behind declaiming across the Channel (with the fortifica- tions of Brest in the distance) " What ! more money ? Oh ! the aristocratic plunderer ! vitel citoyens, mtel dep$chez-vous! or we shall be too late to come in for any smacks of the argent! vife! citoyens, vitel vite! " Gillray also published, at the beginning of December, a caricature on the voluntary loan, in which Pitt is represented in the character of a highwayman, presenting his blunderbuss at John Bull as he la passing by, and asking him for a voluntary contribution. It is scarcely necessary to say that this is a parody on a scene in Gil Bias. England was now fairly entered upon that desperate struggle which eventually, after great sacrifices, raised our national glory to a far higher pitch than it had attained at any former period. The dangers to which this country was then exposed were of no trifling character with a great burthen of taxation already weighing upon it, it was threatened with the whole resentment of a powerful enemy, who expected to find disaffection at our very heart, and who had Ireland ready to rise in rebellion at the first signal that France was advancing to its assistance. Although there must have been more of faction than of real 506 THE GIANT FACTOTUM. patriotism in those who could embarrass the government at such a moment, we yet, perhaps, owe to the obstinate resistance of Fox and his party to the ministerial measures that English liberty was not, in the enthusiasm of the moment, sacrificed to court supremacy to a degree almost as disastrous even as the effects of foreign invasion. We may trace the parliamentary battle of this session in the caricatures of the day, especially in the works of Gillray. The failure of the French expedition which was to have landed in Bantry Bay, produced from this artist, on the aoth of January, a caricature entitled the " End of the Irish Invasion ; or, the destruction of the French Armada." The faces which here man the sinking fleet, are those of Fox, Erskine, Thelwall, and others, whom the Tory satirists placed in the same rank ; the foul winds that have raised the storm in which they are perish- ing, are produced by Pitt, Duudas, Wyndham, and the Marquis of Buckingham, who occupy their mythological station in the clouds. The next day Gillray gave to the public another cari- cature, in which the minister was represented as " the giant factotum amusing himself." Pitt, seated on the canopy over the speaker's chair, in gigantic majesty, is playing at cup and ball with the world ; one foot nearly crushes Fox, Sheridan, Erskine, and other leaders of the opposition ; the other is sup- ported on the shoulder of Dundas, and the head of Wilberforce, while Canning is devoutly kissing the toe, and the members from the Treasury benches are bowing in worship before it. This print was very popular and gave rise to at least one imita- tion. It is said that the facetious Caleb Whiteford, when he first saw it, made an extempore parody on the words of a well- known song : "Jove in Ms chair, Of the skies lord-mayor, When he nods, men, yea gods, stand in awe; O'er St. Stephen's school He holds despotic rule, And his word, though absurd, must be law." The ministers, indeed, now confident in their power, began to treat the opposition with scornful superiority. When Fox con- tinued to declaim against the dangers to which they were exposing the country by their ill-conduct and improvidence, Dundas is said to have spoken of the Whig alarmist in his reply in the following terms: "For a dozen years past he has fol- lowed the business of a Daily Advertiser, in daily stunning our ears with a noise about plots and ruin and treasons and im- THE DAILY ADVERTISER. 50; peachments ; while the contents of his bloody news turn out to be only a Daily Advertisement for a place and a pension." The allusion to the Whig paper told with great effect ; and shortly after, on the 23rd of January, the idea was embodied in a caricature by Gillray, representing Fox, in the character of a ragged newsman, with his horn, shouting the news of the " Daily Advertiser," and knocking, but in vain, at the Treasury gate. In their mortification at the increasing power of their ministerial opponents, the political societies gave utterance fre- quently to imprudent sentiments and expressions, which were turned to the disadvantage of the liberal party as a body. Thus, the following sentiment is said to have been expressed in the Whig club, on the I4th of February: "The tree of liberty must be planted immediately ! this is the something which must be done, and that quickly, too, to save the country from destruction." Gillray 's pencil immediately pictured the tree ot liberty, the planting of which, in the opinion of the Whigs, would be the Salvation of England its foundation, a pile of ghastly heads, at once recognised as those of Sheridan, Stanhope, Thelwall, Home Took, and other active agitators in opposition to government ; its stalk, a bloody spear, sus- taining, as its fruit, the bleeding head of the arch-agitator, Fox. At the latter end of February, the French made a descent on the coast of Wales, without any apparent object or utility, which ended in the immediate capture of the invaders. The opposition quickly raised a cry against the government. A caricature by Gillray, published on the 4th of March, represents the hold which the Whigs thought they had thus gained on the minister, as "Billy in the Devil's claws," the unfortunate premier held in the brawny grasp of Fox ; but the in- telligence of Jervis's brilliant victory over the Spaniards came to set the captive loose, and obliged the evil visitor to let go his hold in chagrin, which is represented in an accom- panying picture of " Billy sending the Devil packing." The whole is entitled " The Tables turned." A new cause of alarm was now furnished by FRUIT OF LIKEUTT. the embarrassments of the Bank of England, arising from the immense sums which had been advanced to government, and the anxiety of people in general to withdraw J-BER- -TAS 508 INSOLENT THREATS OF THE FRENCH. their money, under the apprehension of an invasion ; and, in the- month of February, the bank announced its inability to continue cash payments. Pitt came forward to its assistance with an act of parliament making bank notes a legal tender, and from this time the circulation of gold coin became almost obsolete. Several caricatures appeared on this occasion. In one, the minister was represented attempting a rape on the old lady of Leadenhall-street. Another was a parody on the well-known story of Midas the political Midas (Pitt) instead of turning everything into gold, turned it into paper; in the distance, across the water, a great explosion at Brest blows into the air a cloud of Jacobin sans-culottes armed with daggers, and the wind from it moves the reeds (the English opposition), which sigh forth, "Midas has ears!" The opposition are constantly thus depicted as causing embarrassment to the government at home for the advantage of our enemies abroad. In another caricature on the paper-currency question, Pitt is represented offering bank-notes to John Bull, while Fox and Sheridan are persuading him not to take them. John, however, remains deaf to their arguments. John Bull's courage and patriotism, indeed, increased in intensity, and his dislike of war diminished, as the danger approached nearer and became more imminent. The inso- lence of the French Directory and of their agents, and the atrocious threats which they held out against England, only tended to unite all classes in the defence of their native land. The commander of the army of invasion, General Hoche, had already, in imagination, plundered our capital. "Coura- geous citizens," he said to his followers, in an address which was circulated through France, " England is the richest country in the world and we give it up to you to be plundered. You shall march to the capital of that haughty nation. You shall plunder their national bank of its immense heaps of gold. You shall seize upon all public and private property upon their warehouses their magazines their stately mansions their gilded palaces ; and you shall return to your own country loaded with the spoils of the enemy. This is the only method left to bring them to our terms. When they are humbled, then we shall dictate what terms we think proper, and they must accept them. Behold what our brave army in Italy are doing they are enriched with the plunder of that fine country , and they will be more so, when Eome bestows what, if she does not, will be taken by force. Your country, brave citizens, will not de- mand a particle of the riches you shall bring from Great Britain THE HAT TAX. 59 .Take what you please, it shall be all your own. Arms and ammunition you shall have, and vessels to carry you over. Once landed, you will soon find your way to London." These lines, which were published in most of the English newspapers and magazines in the month of March, added to the martial spirit of the people, whose property was thus threatened, and volunteer troops began to be formed in all parts of the country. The metropolis and its volunteers began again to look like Old London and its trained bands, and caricatures on these soldier- citizens soon became numerous. One by Gillray, published on the ist of March, may be compared with the satires against the city soldiery in the days of George I. it represents, " St. George's volunteers charging down Bond-street, after clearing the ring in Hyde Park, and storming the dunghill at Mary- bone ;" and the assailants are evidently gaining an easy victory over the fashionable loungers of the former locality. A number of pictures representing the horrible consequences of French success, published during March and April, tended to keep the national spirit in a blaze. Still John Bull grumbled at being taxed, although he was so earnestly assured that it was for his own advantage. One of the taxes proposed during the spring of 1797, which gave most room for satire and ridi- cule, was a duty on hats, which people evaded by wearing caps. Gillray, in a caricature, published on the 5th of April, entitled " Le bonnet rouge : or, John Bull evading the hat- tax," intimates the danger that such taxes might drive John Bull to adopt the re- publican costume of his neighbours, and he cer- tainly does look " trans- formed." John chuckles in contemplation of the astonishment that his ruler must feel when he beholds the strange effect of his taxes " Waunds ! when Measter Billy sees I in a red cap how he will stare ! egad, I thinks I shall cook 'en at last ! well, if I could but once get a cockade to my red cap, and a bit of a gun why, I thinks I should make a good stockey soldier." ruu - : JOHN BULL m BONNET BOOGE. Other carica- jio THE MINISTERIAL RAREE-SHOW. tures attacked the increasing system of taxation, and the minis- ter with whom it originated, with much greater severity ; they represented him as practising a continued deception of making professions which he never intended to fulfil, and talking of objects which he took no steps to gain in order to extract the money from John Bull's pocket. A caricature, published on the i5th of August, under the title of " Billy's Raree-Show ; or, John Bull e?i-lighten'd," represents Pitt as the royal showman, picking John's pocket of his "sav- ings," while the latter is looking at his exhibition. The showman, with all due gravity, is directing John's attention " Now, pray, lend your attention to the enchanting pros- pect before you this is the prospect of peace only observe what a busy scene presents itself the ports are filled with ship- ping, the quays loaded with merchandize riches are flowing in from every quarter this prospect alone is worth all the money you have got about you." The simple auditor of this fine speech, totally unconscious of the process to jvhich his pocket is being sub- jected, observes, "Mayhap it may, Master Showman, but I canna zee ony thing loike what you mentions I zees nothing but a woide plain, with some mountains and molehills upoii't as sure as a gun, it must be all behoind one of those!" The flag of the raree-show bears the inscription, "Licensed by Authority, Billy Hum's grand exhibition of moving mechanism; or, deception of the senses." Great as might be the increase of taxes in one session, the next was sure to bring with it the addition of new ones. Scarcely had the parliament begun busi- ness at the end of the year 1797, when it was announced that a heavy addition would be made to the assessed taxes. A carica- turist, in the month of December, in a print entitled, " More visitors to John Bull ; or, the Assessed Taxes," represents these unwelcome guests introducing themselves to John Bull in a bodily form. The latter asks in surprise, as well as alarm, THE DISHONEST SHOWMAN. THE ASSESSED TAXES. 51 r "What do you want, you little devils ? ain't I plagued with enough of you already ? more pick-pocket's work, I suppose ?" The imps reply, in the most courteous manner, " Please your honour, we are the assessed Taxes."* WE ABE THE ASSESSED TAXES. Amid so many subjects of uneasiness, with preparations for invasion without, and when our fleets were in open mutiny at Spithead and the Nore, the question of parliamentary reform was again agitated from one end of the country to the other. In the month of May, Fox and his party made two important efforts in the House of Commons to force the ministry to more liberal measures. On the 23rd, Fox himself moved for the repeal of the acts passed in the preceding session against sedition and treason. The ministers defended warmly their coercive measures, and one of their party declared " that he con- sidered this motion as a tissue of the web that Mr. Fox had been weaving for the last four years, which had tended to degrade this country in the eyes of foreign powers ; had it not been for these acts he believed that the French national flag would have been hoisted on the Tower of London." After a long debate, Fox's motion was rejected by two hundred and sixty votes against fifty-two. On the i6th, Mr. Grey moved for leave to bring in a bill to reform the representation in the country, and explained at considerable length the principal details of his plan. The motion was seconded by Erskine, and the debate lasted till three o'clock in the morning, when it was rejected by a majority of a hundred and forty-nine against ninety-one. The leaders of the opposition now declared their * The only copy of this caricature that I have seen is in the possession of Mr. Burke. 5ia SECESSION OF THE FOXITES. despair of making any impression on the House of Commons, and announced their intention for the present of taking no further part in its proceedings. The voice of Fox was scarcely heard again within the walls of St. Stephen's till after the close of the century. Sheridan alone remained at his post, and it was commonly believed that he had disagreed with his party, and that he was looking out for encouragement to desert to the ministerial side of the House. Upon this occasion the Tories complained louder than ever of the factious behaviour of the opposition ; they said that the opposition had remained in the House as long as there remained any prospect of doing mischief, and then shewed their patriotism by leaving their country to its fate. Gillray published a caricature on the 28 th of May, the spirit of which is sufficiently explained by its title of " Par- liamentary Reform ; or, Opposition rats leaving the House they had undermined." A caricature, published some days later, represents Fox slinking away from the neighbourhood of the House, after his partizans have laid the trains that were to blow up the constitution. Other caricatures traced the opposition leaders into their retreats, and shewed them encouraging and aiding sedition without the House, now that their efforts had proved useless within. On the 5th of June appeared a carica- ture, entitled " Diversions of Purley ; or, Opposition attending their private affairs," represents Fox and his political friends in affectionate homeliness nursing two ill-favoured babes, " Sedition and Revolution." Another caricature, published by Gillray on the 1 6th of June, is entitled " Homer singing his verses to the Greeks ;" it represents Fox and his party round the jovial table, listening to their old minstrel Captain Morris, who, all ragged and wretched, is singing them a new song. Still later on in the year, on the 24th of November, in a caricature entitled " Le coup de maitre," Gillray represented Fox in the character of a political brigand, practising with his gun at the crown, lords, and commons. It is certain that, after the secession of the opposition in the House of Commons, the agitation throughout the country became greater, and the activity of the political societies increased. Political meetings to discuss the necessity of Par- liamentary reform became more frequent. One of the most remarkable of these meetings was held on the grounds at Guy's Cliff, near Warwick, under the favour of Bertie Greathead, Esq., the proprietor of that picturesque locality, and was commemo- rated by a medal, an article at this time very popular as a means of spreading political opinions. Numerous medals had THE ANTI-JACOBIN. 513 been struck for and against Paine. The reform medal com- memorating the meeting at Guy's Cliff, was parodied by a loyal medal, which represented on the obverse the devil holding three halters over the heads of the demagogues, while on one side the "wrong heads" are ap- plauding them, and on the other the "right heads" are shewing disgust at their proceedings. The newspapers now became more violent and abusive, and less scrupulous in their state- ments, when they could serve their party by falsehood or misrepresentation. It was to combat the seditious tendency of the opposition press, the attacks of which assailed the ministers with incessant gall, that the celebrated Anti-Jacobin was established in the latter part of November, 1797. It was conducted by some of the most talented men connected with the administration, and is remarkable for the bitterness of its satire, and the boldness of its personalities. In this respect one party was quite as little scrupulous as the other. The second number of this paper, published on the 27th of November, contained that admirable burlesque by Canning (one of the principal contributors) on the pains taken by the political agitators and so-called philanthro- pists to instil discontent into the lower orders of society, even when of themselves they were not at all inclined to be discontented : THE FRIEND OF HUMANITY AND THE KNIFE-GRINDER. 1 ' Friend of Humanity. " ' Needy knife-grinder ! whither are you going ? Rough is the road, your wheel is out of order Bleak blows the blast your hat has got a hole in 't, So have your breeche-i ! " ' Weary knife-grinder ! little think the proud ones, Who in their coaches roll along the turnpike- road, what hard work 'tis crying all day, ' Knives and Scissors to grind, O ! ' ' ' Tell me, knife-grinder, how you came to grind knives ? Did some rich man tyrannically nse you ? Was it the 'squire ? or parson of the parish ? Or the attorney t L L 514 CELEBRATION OF FOX'S BIRTHDAY. " ' Was it the 'squire for killing of his game ? or Covetous parson for his tythes distraining ? Or roguish lawyer made you lose your little All in a lawsuit? " ' (Have you not read the ' Rights of Man ' by Tom Paine ?) Drops of compassion tremble on my eye-lids, Beady to fall, as soon as you have told your Pitiful story.' " Knife-grinder. " ' Story ! God bless you ! I have none to tell, sir, Only last night, a-drinking at the Chequers, This poor old hat and breeches, as you see, were Torn in a scuffle. " ' Constables came up for to take me into Custody ; they took me before the justice ; Justice Oldmixon put me in the parish- stocks for a vagrant. " ' I should be glad to drink your honour's health in A pot of beer, if you will give me sixpence ; But, for my part, I never love to meddle With politics, sir.' " Friend of Humanity. " ' 7 give thee sixpence ! I will see thee damn'd first ! Wretch ! whom no sense of wrongs can rouse to vengeance ! Sordid, unfeeling, reprobate, degraded, Spiritless outcast ! ' " (Kicks the Knife-grinder, overturns his wheel, and exit in a transport of republican enthusiasm and universal philanthropy.) This burlesque was reprinted in a broadside, on the 4th of December, with a large engraving by Gillray, in which the " friend of humanity" carries the features of Tierney, and it is dedicated " to the independent electors of the borough of Southwark," of which constituency Tierney was the repre- sentative. In their mortification at the steady and overwhelming ministerial majorities in parliament, the opposition seceders seem to have vented their ill-humour in ultra-liberal toasts and speeches at public dinners and entertainments, and under the genial influence of the god to whom their devotions were always fervent, they sometimes uttered sentiments that were not of the most prudent description, and which were eagerly seized upon by their opponents. On the 24th of January, 1 798, a grand dinner was held in the rooms of the Crown and Anchor to cele- brate the birthday of Charles James Fox. Not less than two thousand persons are said to have been present. The Duke of Norfolk presided, and was supported by the Duke of Bedford, THE MAJESTY OF THE PEOPLE. .515 Earls Lauderdale and Oxford, Sheridan, Tierney, Erskine, Home Tooke, and others. Captain Morris produced three new songs for the occasion. After dinner had been withdrawn in the great room, the Duke of Norfolk, as reported in the news- papers, addressed the company nearly as follows : " We are met, in a moment of most serious difficulty, to celebrate the birth of a man dear to the friends of freedom. I shall only recall to your memory, that not twenty years ago, the illustrious George Washington had not more than two thousand men to rally round him when his country was attacked. America is now free. This day full two thousand men are assembled in this place. I leave you to make the application. I propose to you the health of Charles Fox." After this toast had been drunk, and warmly applauded, the duke gave successively, "The Rights of the people;" "Constitutional redress of the wrongs of the people ;" " A speedy and effectual reform in the representation of the people in parliament ;" " The genuine principles of the British constitution;" "The people of Ireland, and may they be speedily restored to the blessings of law and liberty." The health of the chairman was then drunk, to which the duke responded by giving " Our sovereign's health the majesty of the people /" The court gave a much less favourable interpretation to these proceedings than it was probable that the actors in them ever con- templated, and the Tory press was loud in its outcries. The re- sult was, that, within a few days after the meeting, the King dis- missed the Duke of Norfolk from his offices of Lord Lieutenant of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and Colonel in the militia, which caused no less outcry in the newspapers of the opposition. A print by Gillray, published on the 3rd of February, represents the noble toastmaster, giving "the loyal toast," sur- rounded by Fox, Bedford, Stanhope, Sheridan, and others. The duke's seat, in place of a coronet bears the figure of a bonnet rouge. Above his head appear two hands, one holding a pair of scales, the other with a pair of scissors cutting c L L 2 A NOBLE TOAKlMASTER. 516 PATRIOTS DISGRACED. from a long list of the honours bestowed by the crown upon the Norfolk family the two just alluded to. Just three months later, at a meeting of the Whig club, at the Free Masons' Tavern, on Tuesday, the ist of May, Fox gave as a toast, " The sovereignty of the people of Great Britain," and accom- panied it with a speech strongly condemnatory of the conduct of ministers, whom he compared with the French Directory. A similar mark of resentment was shewn towards Fox, as had already been exhibited in the case of the Duke of Norfolk ; the King immediately ordered his name to be erased from the list of the privy council. Ano- ther caricature by Gill- ray, published on the 1 2th of May, represents the dismay of the two disgraced patriots, in a " Meeting of the unfor- tunate citoyens" Pitt and Dundas stand as sentinels at the entrance to St. James's. Fox, who appears to have just been refused admit- tance, exhibits a truly rueful countenance, and meeting the duke, ex- PATBIOTS IN DISMAY. claims, " Scratch'd off! dish'd ! kick'd out, damme!" His companion in misfortune, from whose pocket hangs a paper containing the announcement of his dismissal from the lieutenancy, replies, " How ? what ! kick'd out ! ah ! morbleu ! chacun a son tour ! morbleu ! morbleu!" During these transactions, the French were constantly boast- ing of their preparations for the invasion of this country, and it was openly declared that they were to be assisted with a rebel- lion in Ireland, some discontented and ambitious democrats of that country having been in active communication with the governing powers in Paris. Threatening paragraphs from the French papers found their way continually into the English journals, and helped to keep up the alarm. It was announced that Buonaparte, now one of the most distinguished of the generals of the republic, elated with the victories of his Italian campaign, was to lead his veteran armies against England. A paragraph from a Parisian paper of the a6th of November, FRENCH PREPARATIONS FOR INVASION. 5:7 1797, proclaimed that " The army of England is created ; it is commanded by the conqueror of Italy. After having restored peace to the continent, France is at length about to employ all her activity against the tyrants of the seas." The London newspapers, at the end of December, published the address of the president of the Directory to Buonaparte on his arrival from the south : " Citizen-general ! crown so glorious a career by a conquest which the great nation owes to its outraged dignity. Go, and by the punishment you inflict on the cabinet of London strike terror into all the governments which shall dare to doubt the power of a nation of freemen. Pompey did not disdain to crush a nest of pirates. Greater than the Koman general, go and chain down the gigantic pirate who lords it over the seas : go and punish in London crimes which have remained unpunished but too long. Numerous votaries of liberty wait your arrival ; you will find no enemy but vice and wickedness. They alone support that perfidious government ; strike it down, and let its downfall inform the world, that if the French people are the benefactors of Europe, they are also the avengers of the rights of nations." This constant declaration on the part of France that she expected to secure powerful assistance in England, injured the cause of the opposition in this country, and appeared to confirm the charges brought against them by the Tories, whose indig- nation was raised to the highest pitch, when, in February, the French papers brought over a printed copy of the letter by which the notorious renegade, Paine, conveyed his sentiments on the subject to the council of Five Hundred " Citizen repre- sentatives, though it is not convenient to me, in the present situation of my affairs, to subscribe to the loan towards the descent upon England, my economy permits me to make a small patriotic donation. 1 send a hundred livres, and with it all the wishes of my heart for the success of the descent, and a volun- tary offer of any service I can render to promote it. There will be no lasting peace for France, nor for the world, until the tyranny and corruption of the English government be abolished, and England, like Italy, become a sister republic." As spring approached, the French papers brought frequent intelligence of preparations and orders for this threatened descent. In England the alarm was great, and every measure was again practised that was likely to stir up and sustain a flame of pa- triotism, as well as to make people suspicious of the motievs and designs of those who were in opposition to the ministers. 5i8 LOYAL SONGS POPULAR. Loyal songs became suddenly more popular than all others, and new ones were regularly given to the world in the columns of the Anti-Jacobin and other publications. The following excel- lent parody appeared in this journal early in December : "LA SAINTE GUILLOTINE "From the blood-bedew'd valleys and mountains of France See the genius of Gallic invasion advance ! Old Ocean shall waft her, unruffled by storm, While our shores are all lin'd with the friends of Reform. Confiscation and Murder attend in her train, With meek-eyed Sedition, the daughter of Paine ; While her sportive Poissardes with light footsteps are seen To dance in a ring round the gay guillotine. "To London, 'the rich, the defenceless,' she comes Hark ! my boys, to the sound of the Jacobin drums ! See Corruption, Prescription, and Privilege fly, Pierced through by the glance of her blood-darting eye. While Patriots, from prison and prejudice freed, In soft accents shall lisp the Republican creed, And with tri- coloured fillets, and cravats of green, Shall crowd round the altar of Sainte Guillotine. .. " See the level of Freedom sweeps over the land The vile aristocracy's doom is at hand! Not a seat shall be left in the house that we know, But for Earl Buonapaite and Baron Moreau. But the rights of the Commons shall still be respected- Buonaparte himself shall approve the elected ; And the Speaker shall march with majestical mien, And make his three bows to the grave guillotine. "Two heads, says our proverb, are better than one; But the Jacobin choice is for Five Heads or none. By Directories only can liberty- thrive, Then down with the one, boys ! and up with ihejivef How our bishops and judges will stare with amazement, When their heads are thrust out at the national casement /* When the national razor has shaved them quite clean, What a handsome oblation to Sainte QuiUotine /" A caricature by Gillray, published on the ist of February, 1798, under the title of " The storm rising ; or, The Republican Flotilla in danger," represents Fox, Sheridan, and their allies, drawing the enemy's flotilla to our coast by means of a capstan and cable, while Pitt, from above, is blowing up the storm that is to drive it away in the winds we discern the names of Dun- can, Howe, Gardiner, &c., the admirals who were now making the name of England respected on the seas. The flotilla has in front the flag of "liberty," but the flag behind is inscribed as * La petite fenfire and le rasoir national were popular terms applied to the guillotine by the mob in France. CONSEQUENCES OF FRENCH INVASION. 519 that of " slavery." The turrets and bulwarks represent " mur- der," "plunder," "beggary," and a number of other similar prospects. On the other side of the water are seen the fortifi- cations of Brest, with the guillotine raised on its principal tower, and the devil dancing over it and playing the tune of "Over de vater to Charley!" Plenty of pictures were now published, to shew the disastrous state of things to be expected in this country, when the Whigs should have helped the French to the mastery. Of these the most remarkable was a series of four plates, engraved by Gillray, and published on the ist of March, and said, in the corner of each plate, to be " invented " by Sir John Dalrymple. They are entitled, " The consequences of a successful French invasion." The first represents the House of Commons occupied by the triumphant democra is ; the mace, records, and other furniture of the house, are involved in one common destruction, and the members are fettered in pairs, in the garb of convicts, ready for transportation to Botany Bay. In the second, the House of Lords is the scene of similar havoc ; a guillotine, supported by two Turkish mutes with their bows, occupies the place of the throne ; and the commander-in-chief, in his full republican uniform, pointing to the mace, says to one of his creatures, " Here, take away this bauble ! but if there be any gold on it, send it to my lodging." In the third plate, the good people of England, in rags and wooden shoes, are forced to till the ground, while their proud republican task-masters follow them with the whip. The fourth is a lesson for Ireland ; having come over with the specious pretext of delivering the Ca- tholic faith from Pro- testant supremacy, they abuse the Ca- tholic clergy and plunder and profane their churches. A FRBNCn REFORMER IN PARLIAMENT. 520 IRISH BEBELLION. Ireland was at this time breaking out into open rebellion, and occupied the attention of both political parties in England as seriously as the threatened invasion from France. The Whigs accused the Tories of having provoked the Irish into resistance by their tyrannical measures, and affected sympathy for their sufferings ; the Tories accused the Whigs of having encouraged disaffection by their example, and by the propagation of their republican doctrines. Among those who preached most about English injustice in the sister islaud, was Lord Moira, who has been mentioned before as Lord Eawdon, and who was incessant in his declamations against English misrule. A caricature, published by Gillray on the 1 2th of March, represents him as "Lord Longbow, the alarmist, discovering the miseries o'f Ire- land," and doing his best to blow the diminutive flame across the channel into a blaze with his small breath. On the 2oth of March, Gillray published a caricature, entitled " Search Night; or, State Watch- men mistaking honest men for Conspira- tors," in which Pitt and Dundas, as watch- men, are breaking through the door of the secret apartment in which the " Corre- sponding Society" are supposed o be de- liberating. They find the room full of daggers, caps of libert} r , &c., and a party of conspirators brooding over Irish insur- rection. The approach of the watchmen has been the signal for a general flight ; the Dukes of Bedford and Norfolk make their escape through the chimney; Fox and Sheridan mount through a trap-door ; Tierney and two others seek concealment under the table ; Moira alone, who boasted that he managed well with both parties, stands his ground: over the mantel- piece are portraits of Robespierre and Buonaparte. In June, people were excited against the Irish by pictures of the atroci- ties committed by the rebels, which rivalled almost the doings of French republicanism ; and, among other caricatures on the same subject, published in October, is a picture of " The allied Republics of France and Ireland," in which the French ally, after enriching himself by plunder, is riding upon poor Ireland transformed into a donkey. This picture is accompanied by a LOBD LONGBOW THE ALARMIST. CAEICATUEES ON THE WHIGS. 521 mock song, burlesquing the national burthen of "Erin go bragh :" " From Brest in the Bay of Biskey Me come for de very fine whiskey, To make de Jacobin friskey, While Erin may go bray. " Me have got de mealy pottato From de Irish democrato, To make de Jacobin fat, O, While Erin may go bray. " I get by de guillotine axes De wheats and de oats, and de Saxes, De rents, and de tydes, and de taxes, While Erin may go bray. " I put into requisition De girl of every condition, For Jacobin coalition, And Erin may go bray. " De linen I get in de scuffle Will make de fine shirt to my ruffle, While Pat may go starve in his hovel, And Erin may go bray. " De beef is good for my belly, De calf make very fine jelly, For me to kiss Nora and Nelly, And Erin may go bray. " Fitzgerald and Arter O'Connor To Erin have done de great honour To put me astride upon her, For which she now does bray. "She may fidget and caper and kick, O, But by de good help of Old Nick, O, De Jacobin ever will stick, O, And Erin may go bray." The Whigs continued to be caricatured as the patrons of French principles, whether in England or in Ireland. Gillray published, on the i8th of April, a series of "French Habits," in which the principal English Whigs were equipped in the gay theatrical costumes of the different officers of the French republi- can government of that time ; Fox led the way as " le ministre d'etat en grand costume." On the 23rd of May, a caricature by Gillray parodied Milton in representing " The Tree of Liberty, with the Devil tempting John Bull." Fox, as the serpent, is offering John Bull the apple of " Keform ;" but the latter is not to be tempted, for his pockets are tilled with better fruit. A caricature by the same artist, published on the z6th of May, 523 PREPARATIONS AGAINST INVASION. represents the " Shrine at St. Anne's Hill ;"* Fox worshipping the bonnet rouge, which is supported on a republican altar, with the bust of Robespierre on one side, and that of Buonaparte on the other ; the heads of the other leaders of the opposition, with red caps on their heads, appear as cherubs attendant on his devotions. In another caricature by Gillray, entitled "Nightly Visitors at St. Anne's Hill," published on the 2ist of September, the ghosts of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, and the headless trunks of others who had fallen a sacrifice in their rebellion against the government in Ireland, are made to disturb Fox in his slumber, and accuse him of having been their first seducer. The threats of France and her ostentatious preparations, had greatly injured the cause of the Whigs in England, where the warlike spirit had been increased by the victories gained by Duncan and other admirals at sea. Our fleet seemed to be rapidly rising in glory since the repression of the memorable mutiny at the Nore. The enthusiasm was kept up by every kind of incentive, even by " loyal " performances at the theatres. On the pth of February, a tragedy, entitled "England Pre- served," an interlude, and the farce of the " Poor Sailor," were acted at Covent Garden Theatre, and the receipts of the house appropriated to the voluntary contribution for the defence of the country. There were present Lord Bridport and Lord Hood, whose healths being drunk in the interlude occasioned such extraordinary bursts of applause, that both those naval heroes were obliged to come forward and shew themselves to the audience. This and other performances were accompanied with appropriate prologues, epilogues, and addresses, all calculated to produce the same effect. Even Captain Morris became loyal, and wrote some truly patriotic songs, of which the following, which was very popular in the month of May, is one of the best : A LOYAL SONG. " Ye brave sons of Britain, whose glory hath long Supplied to the poet proud themes for his song, Whose deeds have for ages astonish'd the world, When your standard you 've hoisted or sails have unfurl'd ; France raging with shame at your conquering fame, Now threatens your country with slaughter and flame. But let them come on, boys, on sea, or on shore, We '11 work them again, as we 've worked them before. * Charles James Fox's country house in Surrey, to which he retired after the secession of the opposition in the House of Commons. BATTLE OF THE NILE. 5*3 " Now flush" d with the blood of the slaves they have slain, These foes we still beat swear they'll try us again ; But the more they provoke us, the more they will see, 'Tis in vain to forge chains for a nation that 's free : All their rafts, and their floats, and their flat-bottom'd boats, Shall not cram their French poison down Englishmen's throats. So let them come on, &e. ' They hope by their falsehoods, their tricks, and alarms, To split us in factions, and weaken our arms ; For they know British hearts, while united and true, No danger can frighten, no force can subdue ; Let 'em try every tool, every traitor, and fool, But England, old England no Frenchman shall rule. So let them come on, &c. " How these savage invaders to man have behav'd, We see by the countries they 've robb'd and enslav'd ; Where, masking their curse with blest Liberty's name, They have starv'd them, and bound them in chains and in shame. Then their traps they may set, we're aware of the net, And in England, my hearties, no gudgeons they '11 get. So let them come on, &c. " Ever true to our king, constitution, and laws, Ever just to ourselves, ever staunch to our cause ; This land of our blessings, long guarded with care, No force shall invade, boys, no craft shall ensnare. United we '11 stand, firm in heart, firm in hand, And those we don't sink, we '11 do over on land. So let them come on," &c. As the summer approached, all fears of invasion vanished away, and the departure of Buonaparte for Egypt shewed that the ambition of France was directed for the present to another quarter. At the beginning of October, the news of the great and decisive victory of the Nile came to cheer all hearts, except those of the seditious few who had built their prospects on the assistance of French bayonets. The Tories exulted over the supposed mortification and chagrin of men who certainly did not lament their country's glory, and a print by Gillray, pub- lished on the 3rd of October (the day after the announcement of the battle in the gazette), under the title of "Nelson's vic- tory ; or, Good news operating upon loyal feelings," represents the different Whig leaders giving unequivocal evidence of their disappointment. A caricature, published on the 6th, represents Nelson with a club, inscribed, " British Oak " clearing the Nile of its monsters it is entitled, " Extirpation of the Plagues of Egypt ; destruction of revolutionary crocodiles ; or, The British hero cleansing the mouth of the Nile." Scarcely a day now passed without bringing intelligence of some new success of the British navy at sea, and John ^ull seemed in danger of being JOHN BULL'S LUNCHEON. surfeited with the multitude of his captures. On the 24th of October, Gillray published his caricature of "John Bull taking a luncheon ; or, British cooks cramming old Grumble-Gizzard with bonne chSre." John sitting at his well-furnished table, is almost overwhelmed by the zealous attentions of his (naval) cooks, foremost among whom, the hero of the Nile is offering him a " fricassee a la Nelson," a large dish of battered French ships of the line. The other admirals, in their characters of cooks, are crowding round, and we distinguish among their contributions to John's table, " fricando a la Howe," " Des- sert a la Warren," "Dutch cheese a la Duncan," and a variety of other dishes, " a la Vincent," " a la Bridport," " a la Gardiner," &c. John Bull is deliberately snapping up u frigate at a mouthful, and he is evidently fattening fast upon his new diet ; he exclaims, as his cooks gather round him, " What ! more frigasees! why, A GOOD CATERER. vou ro g ues vou> where do you think I shall find room to stow all you bring in ?" Beside him stands an immense jug of "true British stout" to wash them down ; and be- hind him, a picture of "Buonaparte in Egypt," suspended against the wall, is concealed by Nelson's hat, which is hung over it. Through the window we see Fox and Sheridan running away in dismay at John Bull's voracity. It was now pretty generally the hope of some, and the fear of many, in France as well as in JOHN BULL TAKING A LUNCHEON. England, that Buona- parte would never be able to get back to his own country, and all eyes were fixed JACK TAR SETTLING BUONAPARTE. 5*5 with anxiety upon the East. Gillray published a caricature on the 2oth of November, entitled " Fighting for the dunghill j or, Jack Tar settling Buonaparte," in which Jack is manfully- disputing his enemy's right to supremacy over the world j the nose of the latter gives evident proof of " punishment." Jack Tar has his advanced foot on Malta, while Buonaparte is seated, not very firmly, on Turkey. At home the plan of a descent upon England was so far modified, that the invasion was to be made through Ireland, and the command of the army destined for this purpose was given to the republican General Hoche ; but, while Jack Tar was thus settling Buonaparte in the DISPUTED POSSESSION. East, General Hoche died unexpectedly in France, and so entirely had the success of our fleets restored the feeling of security in England, that his disappearance from the stage would hardly have been perceived, had it not been announced by the grand print of Gillray, entitled "The Apotheosis of Hoche," published on the nth of December, 1/98, and the representing in one vast panorama the horrors of the French revolution crowded around its hero. The same year that wit- nessed the signal defeat of the navy of France, saw also the overthrow of the French prospects in Ireland, by the suppres- sion of the rebellion. During the spring and summer of 1798, the prosecutions for political offences had increased in number, and the whole country seems to have been invaded with an army of spies and informers. Men were dragged into court on informations of the most trifling and ridiculous kind, and it was long before this country was 526 NEW COALITION. relieved from the evils of a disgraceful system, which, in the blindness of momentary enthusiasm, the ministry of William Pitt had been allowed to establish. An amusing caricature on this subject, published on the 2nd of April, and alluding appa- rently to some incident that had occurred at Winchester, is entitled " The Sedition Hunter disappointed ; or, d g by Winchester Measure." An honest farmer is dragged into court by an informer, who accuses him of having uttered the treason' able expression, " D n Mr. Pitt." The sensation against the informer is unequivocally expressed ; and the judge, in this case, comes to the sage opinion in the matter of law, " If a man is disposed to d n, he may as well d n Mr. Pitt as anybody else." The Tories continued to exult over the defeat of " the party." There had taken place at the beginning of the year a sort of coalition between the Foxites and some of the more violent demo- crats, such as Home Tooke and Frend, who had formerly repu- diated Fox as not sufficiently democratic in his views, but who now expressed themselves satisfied at his declaration in favour of parliamentary reform, and proclaimed the necessity of union. On the 3oth of October, after the glorious successes which had added so much to the strength of the ministers in power, Gillray published a caricature entitled, " The Funeral of the Party," in which the bier of party is borne along with a lugu- brious procession, Fox, Sheridan, and their friends marching behind it as chief mourners; the Duke of Norfolk leads the procession, bearing the banner inscribed the " Majesty of the People ;" and behind him Home Tooke reads the service from "The Eights of Man." This was followed, on the 6th of November, by "Stealing off; or, Prudent Secession," a carica- ture alluding to the secession of the Whigs in the previous spring, and representing Fox flying from the House, where the opposition bowed down their heads overwhelmed by the suc- cesses of government. On the i yth of November, came "The Fall of Phaeton," Fox struck from his chariot by the lightning -of royalty, and the Whig club involved in his destruction. Home Tooke had now become one of the most prominent members of the reform confederacy ; at one period of his career, when acting (as it was said) in "the pay of government, he had published a pamphlet under the title of " Two Pair of Portraits," in which he contrasted, much to the advantage of the former, the two Pitts with the two Foxes. A caricature by Gillray on this subject, of which the accompanying plate is an accurate copy, was published on the ist of December, with the Anti- PROPERTY AND INCOME TAX. 527 Jacobin Review ; Home Tooke is redaubing his portrait of Charles Fox, and is surrounded on every side with pictures allusive to the varying principles of his life. The parliamentary session of 1799, opened at the end of November, 1 798, when Fox kept his word of absenting himself from the debates ; yet in the caricatures he was always placed foremost in the opposition. The announcement of a property and income tax at the beginning of December, produced a cari- cature, published on the i3th, under the ironical title of "Meeting of the Moneyed Interest," in which Fox with a begging-box by his side, is exciting against the bill a meeting of which the greater part appears to be anything but " moneyed." It was Fox, according to the same caricatures, who, in his love of faction, was now creating every possible obstacle to Pitt's favourite measure of the Irish union. A caricature by Gillray entitled, " Horrors of the Irish Union," published on the 24th of December, represents Britannia on one side of the channel, reposing amid plenty and happiness, offering to Ireland on the other side a " Union of security, trade, and liberty." The face of Fox is just seen from behind a bush, (which conceals him from Britannia, who appears not to be aware of his presence), whispering across the channel, " Hip ! my old friend, Pat ! hip ! a word in your ear ! take care of yourself, Pat ! or you'll be ruined past redemption. Don't you see that this d d Union is only meant to make a slave of you ? Do but look how that cursed hag is forging fetters to bind you, and preparing her knap- sack to carry off your property, and to ravish your whole country, man, woman, and child! why, you are blind, sure! Rouse yourself, man ! raise all the lawyers and spur up the corpora- tions ; fight to the last drop of blood, and part with the last potato to preserve your property and independence !" Pat, who is covered with rags and wretchedness, whose whole property is comprised in a broken pike, his house in flames in the distance, looks, to use his own expression, entirely "bothered." He scratches his head as he makes his reply, " Plunder and knap- sacks ! and ravishments and ruin of little Ireland ! why, by St. Pathrick, it's very odd, now ; for the old girl seems to me to be offering me her heart and her hand, and her trade and the use of her shUlalee to defend me, into the bargain ! By Jasus, if you was not my old friend, Charley, I should think you meant to bother me with your whisperings, to put the old lady in a passion, that we may not buss one another, or be friends any more." The year 1799 was that a ^ w hich the outcry against sedition ..,28 IRISH UNION PROPOSED. was greater than at any previous period, and in which extraor- dinary measures were taken to restrain the liberty or licence of the press. In July, the ministry put in effect the extreme measure of subjecting printing-presses to a licence. The Tory caricatures still boasted of the absolute defeat of opposition, and they imagined that in its despair it was laying secret trains for the destruction of the constitution, and were continually calling for severer political persecution. The King's Bench, and New- gate, and Coldbath Fields, . began to be filled with political offenders ; the last had received the popular epithet of the "Bastile." A caricature published with the Anti-Jacobin Review, and entitled, " A charm for democracy, reviewed, analysed, and destroyed, January ist, 1799, ^ ^ confusion of its affiliated friends," represents the members of the opposi- tion assembled in the cave of Despair, where Tooke and two of his violent colleagues, as witches, are mixing up the caldron of sedition, under the immediate presidency of the evil one. The incantation is " Eye of Straw, and toe of Cade, Tyler's brow, Kosciusko's blade, Russell's liver, tongue of cur, Norfolk's boldness, Fox's fur ; Add thereto a tiger's chaldron, For the ingredients of our caldron." Above, in the sky, appears the King on his throne, backed by his ministers, throwing a glare of light on the machinations of the disaffected patriots. The King says, " Our enemies are con- founded!" Pitt urges, "Suspend their bodies!" But the chancellor, more careful of the forms of law, says, " Take them to the King's Bench and Coldbath Fields." On the 22nd of January, the proposition for a union with Ireland was laid before Parliament in a message from the Crown. This subject, with the rebellion of the preceding year, caused the affairs of the sister island for some time to occupy a con- siderable share of public attention in this country. Caricatures on the subject were very numerous, as well as prints exhibiting respectively the violence and cruelty of the rebels, and the con- sequence of French influence. On the ist of March was pub- lished with the Anti- Jacobin Review & print, apparently from the pencil of Rowlandson * (a copy of which is given in the accom- panying plate), entitled "An Irish howl." It represents the * Most of Kowlandson's earlier political caric itures were published without his name, and many of them were not engraved by himself, so that JOHN BULL'S GUARDIAN ANGEL. 5 2 9 A GUARDIAN ANGEL. United Irishmen terror-struck at a vision of the consequences of the French republican influence which they had invoked. The property and income tax was a fruitful source of populai complaint. Gillray published on the i3th of March a caricature entitled " John Bull at his studies, attended by his guardian angel;" in which John Bull is seen puzzling himself over an immense mass of paper, rather ironi- cally entitled, "A plain, short, and easy description of the different clauses in the income tax, so as to render it familiar to the meanest capacity." He re- marks very gravely, " I have read many crabbed things in the course of my time ; but this for an easy piece of business is the toughest to understand I ever met with. " Above, Pitt appears, as John's guardian angel, playing to him upon the Irish harp, "Cease, rude Boreas, blust'ring railer, , Trust your fortune's care to me." A paper on the table bears the descriptive lines, "The sweet little cherub that sits up aloft, To keep watch for the purge of poor Jack." Various seizures were made about this time of the persons and papers of some of the active members of the political societies, and the latter were laid before a secret committee of the House of Commons ; but, although much noise was made on the subject, very little of importance was found among them. The populace, however, was made to believe the contrary ; and a large and elaborate print by Gillray, published on the 1 5th of April, entitled an "Exhibition of a democratic conspiracy, with its effects upon patriotic feelings," represents the Whig leaders it is not always easy to recognise them. The plate of which we are hero speaking, however, bears very evident traces of his style, especially in some of the faces. M M 530 THE ENGLISH DEMOCRATS. turning away in dismay from the light thrown upon their proceedings by the committee, which illuminates a large trans- parency, exhibiting in four compartments the expected pro- ceedings of the democrats in power, as they had been described over and over again in the Tory prints during the few years preceding : first, they plunder the bank, then they assassinate the Parliament (Fox is stabbing Pitt), next, they steal the crown and the regalia from the Tower (Fox is carrying off the crown, and a party of sweeps are making a bonfire of the records), and, lastly, they welcome the entry of the victorious French soldiery into the palace of St. James's. There must have been few persons left who would pay much attention to such exagge- rated improbabilities as these. Yet the caricaturists persisted in their tactics of identifying English Whigs with French repub- licans. On iJie 7th of May, Gillray published a series of engravings entitled a " New Pantheon of Democratic Mytho- logy," in one of which Fox, in allusion to his secession and retirement to the privacy of St. Anne's Hill is represented under the character of " Hercules reposing ;" in another, Tierney, Sir George Shuckborough, and Mr. Jekyl, as " Harpies defiling the feast," are spoiling John Bull's roast-beef, plum-pudding, and pot of porter ; and in a third the Duke of Bedford is represented as "the affrighted centaur" flying from the British lion. In another caricature by Gillray, published on the ist of May, Fox is represented in bed, ridden over by the Hiberno- Gallic repub- lican nightmare. It is a parody on the well-known picture by Fuseli. During the summer of 1799, domestic agitation seems to have experienced a calm ; but, when the Parliament opened at the end of September, the necessity of .levying new taxes soon stirred up new subjects of discontent. Among the taxes now announced was one upon beer, which would have the effect of raising the price of porter to fourpence the pot, and which would weigh especially heavy upon the labouring classes. The satirists on the Tory side pretended to sympathize most with the staunch old Whig, Dr. Parr, who was a great porter drinker and smoker, and no less an opponent of the government of William Pitt ; and, on the 29th of November, Gillray published a spirited sketch of the supposed " Effusions of a Pot of Porter ; or, minis- terial conjurations for supporting the war, as lately discovered by Dr. P r, in the froth and fumes of his favourite beverage." A pot of fourpenny is placed on a stool, with the doctor's pipe and tobacco beside it ; from the froth of the porter arises Pitt, mounted on the white horse, brandishing a flaming sword, and THE UNION WITH IRELAND. 53' DEATH IN THE POT. breathing forth war and destruction on everything around. The doctor's "reverie" is a satire on the innumerable mis- chiefs which popular clamour laid to the charge of the minister : " Fourpeuce a pot for porter ! mercy upon us ! Ah ! it's all owing to the war and the cursed ministry ! Have not they ruined the harvest ? have not they blighted all the hops ? have not they brought on the destructive rains, that we might be ruined in order to support the war ? and bribed the sun not to shine, that they may plunder us in the dark ? (Vide, the Doctor's reveries, every day after dinner.)" It took nearly two years to com- plete the union with Ireland; diffi- culties of various kinds arose, and had to be overcome ; and some of these led eventually to the resigna- tion of the minister. It was not till the first day of the new century that the two sisters were allowed at last to join in that kindly " buss " which a former caricature insinuated that it was the aim of the Whigs to hinder.* The Union took effect on the ist of January, 1 80 1, and on the next day appeared the proclamation of the King's new royal titles, from .which that of King of France, with the fleur-de- lis, was omitted. With the end of the century the continent of Europe entered upon a new phase of its history. After a long stay in the east, which had no other result than that of ex- hibiting to the world an extra- ordinary picture of the reckless injustice and rapacity of repub- * This cut is taken from a large caricature byGillray, published in 1801, entitled "The Union Club." The two figures there occupy the back of the president's chair. M M 2 A Kl S AT LAST. 53* BUONAPARTE FIRST CONSUL. lican France, Buonaparte made his escape from Egypt. He appeared suddenly in France, and succeeded in overthrowing the Directory, and placing himself at the head of the state, under the title of first consul, on the i3th of December, 1799. The republic had now but a nominal existence, and even this shadow of the so long vaunted French liberty had but a tem- porary duration. The war had been carried on by England at sea with unvarying success ; and the troops of the republic had sustained several severe defeats on the continent of Europe before the allied armies of the new coalition, which had been formed at the commencement of the year. Buonaparte, imme- diately after his appointment as first consul, made an attempt to get himself recognised on the footing of a sovereign prince by King George, but without success. Yet during the year 1800, the war seemed to fall spontaneously into a calm, and no actions of great importance were fought by sea or land. A caricature by Gillray remains as a memorial of the overthrow of the French Directory; it was published on the 2ist of November, 1 799, and is entitled " Exit Liberte & la Fran9aise ! or, Buona- parte closing the farce of Egalit6 at St. Cloud, near Paris, Nov. loth, 1799." 533 CHAPTER XIV. GEORGE in. Society during the latter part of the Eighteenth Century Costume ; Extra- vagance of Fashions The Balloon Mania Gambling and its Con- sequences ; Lord Kenyon and the Gambling Ladies Revival of Masquerades ; Mrs. Cornelys and the Pantheon ; Licentiousness of the Masquerades The Opera, and its Abuses The Stage; Sheridan, Kemble, the 0. P. Riots Private Theatricals ; Wargrave and Wynn- stay ; the Pic-Nics The Shakspeare Mania ; Ireland's Forgeries, and Boydell's Shakspeare Gallery Art, Literature, and Science Peter Pindar and the Artists The Venetian Secret State of the Periodical Press ; Literature in General ; Bozzy and Piozzi Science ; the Socie- ties ; Sir Joseph Banks. WHEN we look into the state of society in England, during the latter part of the last century, we must acknowledge the existence of many of the same causes which had led to such a fearful convulsion in the social system in France. Rousseaus and Voltaires were not wanting among our writers, and the fashion- able philosophy of the day had made a deep impression. Hand in hand with it went a widely-spreading spirit of immorality and licentiousness. The mania of gambling was rendering people reckless, and throwing numbers on the world who were ready to follow any desperate course, in the hope of retrieving their shattered fortunes. The unjust monopoly of patronage by the aristocratic influence, and the neglect of a large mass of the talent of the country, was gradually teaching disaffection to the latter, and making it eager for any change that promised a chance of reaching the elevation to which it aspired. In all these respects, English society was closely imitating the example set in France ; as it was in frivolity of manners, and in the extravagance of modes and dress. This imitation, towards the end of the century, was extending itself more and more into the middle classes of society, and we then, for the first time, hear general complaints that the daughters of tradesmen and farmers were sent for education to fashionable boarding-schools, and were taught to exchange the homely duties of their station for the modish accomplishments of fine ladies. The strange vagaries in the forms of costume, among the haut ton, may be looked upon in some degree as indexes of the manners of the age, and are therefore not unworthy of our attention. For some years preceding the French revolution 534 THE BAILIFF OUTWITTED. the dress of the ladies was distinguished by the same superfluity in dimensions and stiffness in form that had shone so conspicu- ously in the costume of the age of the Macaronis. The artificial mass of head-dress had, it is true, heen discarded, and the natural hair had been allowed to form the chief ornament of the head, though frizzled into a bush ; but this coiffure had been followed by enormously broad-brimmed hats, and the dress of the body was gathered into immense projections before and behind. This costume, than which nothing could be less graceful or more absurd, soon became the object of abundance of jokes and ridicule. The prominence before was made to cover the bosom, and to make it seem unnaturally large ; it was formed of linen and gauze, and went by the name of a buffont. The prominence behind was placed lower, and was equally ugly and ridiculous. Broad caricatures represented the inconvenience of such append- ages to the person ; whilst others pretended to shew that they might be turned to useful purposes on extraordinary occasions. They originated, it appears, like most other fashions in dress which have prevailed in this country, in Paris, and there it was said that the posterior prominence was turned to a good account for the purpose of smuggling brandy through the gates of the city; a caricature, published in 1786, represents, in a humorous manner, the discovery of the fraud. The purposes to which such dresses were to be turned in Eng- land are described as exhibiting still greater ingenuity. The dress was so arti- ficially built, and so much larger than the body, that it was supposed that the latter might be withdrawn from its covering without seriously deranging it ; in a cari- cature, published on the 6th of May, 1786, entitled, "The bum-bailiff out- witted," a lady is represented as thus es- caping from the hands of her pursuer. The bailiff is seizing her from behind, and holding forth his warrant with one hand ; while the lady slips away en chemise below, leaving the shell without the sub- stance hat, wig, and dress sustain them- so . wel j in his g^p, that it is some time before he perceives the trick which has been put upon him. In the January of the year following (1787), when the dimensions of the hats, as well as of the pro- minences behind and before, had increased considerably, a cari- cature, entitled "Mademoiselle Parapluie," shews how, in a THB BAIIO? OUTWITTED. MADEMOISELLE PAEAPLUIE. 535 sudden shower, this dress might be made to serve the purpose of an enormous umbrella, and shelter under its protection a whole family ; As it will be ob- served in this last ca- ricature, the other sex had begun to adopt a hat resembling in form that worn by the la- dies, instead of the cocked hat previously in use. It was with the entire change in the character of the dress of both sexes, which followed the French revolution, that the tall, narrow- brimmed hat for men the precursor of the hat as worn at the present day was first introduced. At the same time came in large cravats, frilled shirts, and breeches bagging out in the upper part, but contracting to the thighs, and buttoned close down the legs. At the same time came an absolute rage for striped patterns, which procured for the wearers and their apparel the title of " zebras." A fop of this period is here given, from a caricature published on the apth of March, 1791, entitled "Jemmy Lincum Feadle :" the style is French in the extreme, and the print is accompanied with the lines so often applied in similar cases, but never more appropriately : *' Whoe'er with curious eye has ranged Through Ovid's tales, has seen Dow Jove incensed to monkeys changed A tribe of worthless men. MADEMOISELLE PABAPLUII. " Jove with contempt the men survey' d, Nor would a name bestow ; But woman liked the motley breed, And call'd this thing a beru." A "zr.Biu.* 53<5 FASHIONS AFTER THE REVOLUTION. With the opening of the revolutionary period, the costume of the ladies underwent a very remarkable change in two of its striking peculiarities : the extraordinary stiffness and redun- dancy which had characterized the dress of the succeeding period was suddenly changed for extreme lightness and loose- ness, and the waist, which had formerly been long, was dimi- nished until it disappeared altogether. The buffonts and the " rumps " (as they were politely termed), disappeared also ; the breasts, instead of being thickly covered, were allowed to protrude naked from the robe, which was very light, and hung loose from the bosom, with thin petticoats only beneath. A turban of muslin was wrapped round the head, surmounted with one, two, or three (seldom more) very high feathers, and often with straw, the manufactures in which had now been carried to great perfection. It appears to have been in 1794 that this fashion first reached so extravagant a point as to become an object of general ridicule ; and the caricatures of dress during that and the fol- lowing years are very nume- rous. The one here given, from a print ascribed to Gill- ray, represents an exquisite of each sex in the month of May of the year just men- tioned ; the gentleman is still distinguished by the great cravat and the zebra vest, which latter is made all of a piece, and so as to give him the appearance of being as lightly covered as his partner. The immense cravats of the men are caricatured in other prints which appeared during this year. In a caricature by Gillray, published in the year following, entitled " A lady putting on her cap," the lady requires the aid of two maids to hold up the immense length of muslin which, seated at her toilet, she is wrapping round her head in the form of a turban. This turban, and its single feather rising high into the air, as well as the naked breasts and the deficiency of waist, are exhibited in the next figure, taken from a caricature entitled "The Graces for 1/94," published on the aist of July in that EXQUISITES IN 1794. DISAPPEARANCE OF LADIES? WAISTS. 537 year. This lady wears another personal ornament in vogue at this period among the ladies a watch of very large dimensions, with an enormous bunch of seals, &c., suspended from the girdle immediately below the breasts. From this girdle, without any waist, the robe flows loosely, giving the whole person an appear- ance as if the legs sprang immediately from the bosom. This peculiarity was carried to still greater extravagance towards the end of the year. On the ist of December, 1794, a caricature, entitled " The Rage ; or, Shep- herds, I have lost my waist," represents a lady in this predicament, refusing cakes and jelly offered her by an attendant, because her dressmaker had left her no body wherein to bestow either ; it is accompanied with a parody on a popular song : " Shepherds, I have lost my waist, Have you seen my body ? Sacrificed to modern taste, I'm quite a hoddy-doddy !" " For fashion I that part forsook Where sages place the belly ; Tis gone and I have not a nook For cheesecake, tart, or jelly. QNE oy T({E *' Never shall I see it more, Till common sense returning, My body to my legs restore, Then I shall cease from mourning. *' Folly and fashion do prevail To such extremes among the fair, A woman's only top and tail, The body's banish'd God knows where !" This absolute banishment of the body from the female form is exhibited in the adjoining figure of a lady in full promenade dress, taken from a caricature by Gillray, entitled " Following the fashion," published on the pth of December, 1794. This caricature, in the original, consists of two compartments : in the first, the figure here given is described as " St. James's giving the ton, a soul without a body ;" the other presents a coarse fat dame of the city, finely but vulgarly dressed, who' 538 PARASOLS. from her corpulence would find some difficulty in getting rid of her body she is an emblem of " Cheapside aping the mode, a body without a soul." The dress of the man of fashion appears to have remained much the same from 1791 till near the end of the century, with the excep- tion of the hat, which, at the period of which we are now speaking (1794 and 1795), took several fantastic shapes, having in some cases an enormously broad brim turned up at the sides. On the promenade the ladies of fashion threw their hair back over the shoulders, and wore a hat resembling in form that of the other sex, but much smaller, with immense bushes of straw above. This also was the period when parasols came into general use, and they were carried in the manner represented in the following figures, taken from a caricature published on the i5th of January, and entitled "Parasols for 1795." The lady's hair, in this instance, appears to be spread out and plaited at the ends, and it extends over her back in such a manner as to answer almost the purposes of a mantle. The fashionable pair are represented in full promenade costume, and the hat of the gentleman and the lady's parasol appear to answer much the same purpose. During this year, the loose dresses, especially for in-door parties, continued in fashion with the lofty feathers, which, to judge by their representation in the engravings of the time, must have had a picturesque effect in large assemblies. The short waists also still furnished matter for ridicule. In a cari- cature published on the 4th of August, 1795, the ladies' dresses are ridiculed under the title of " Waggoners' frocks, or no bodys of 1795." The satirists began also at this time to cry out against short petticoats, and it appears to have become the fashion to expose the legs. Straw was coming more and more into vogue, and was more especially used in the head- dresses, and in the out-of-doors costume, and sometimes so pro- fusely scattered over the head and body that a print published on the 1 2th of July, represents a fashionable lady under the title of " A bundle of straw." It was at this period that straw-bonnets began to come into use. An epilogue spoken at Drury Lane, in November, joked on the prevailing fashion. NO-BODY. STRAW HEAD-DEESSES. 539 "What a fine harvest this gay season yields ! Some female beau's appear like stubble-fields. Who now of threaten 'd famine dare complain, When every female forehead teems with grain t See how the wheat-sheaves nod amid the plumes ! Our barns are now transferred to drawing-rooms ; While husbands who delight in active lives To fill their granaries may thrash their wives. Nor wives, alone prolific, notice draw, Old maids and young ones, all are in the straw f The loose style of the frock is ridiculed in a caricature published on the pth of December, under the title, "A fashionable information for ladies in the country," which is illustrated by an extract from some one of the milliners' PARASOM FOB 1795. announcements for the season " the present fashion is the most easy and graceful imaginable it is simply this the petticoat is tied round the nock, and the arms are put through the pocket-holes." The fashion of light covering and exposure of the person was 54 LIGHT COVERING OF THE LADIES. increasing at the beginning of 1 796. A caricature published on the zoth of January, intended to improve on the actual manners of the day and picture " A lady's dress as it soon will be," represents the loose frock the only covering so arranged as to expose to view at every movement the whole of the body below the waist. According to other caricatures, the dresses actually worn were approaching fast towards such a con- summation ; for the body is re- presented as covered with little more than a mere light frock, the very pocket-holes of which be- came the subject of many a wicked joke. Gillray, in a carica- ture published on the i^th of February, 1796, endeavours to shew that these pocket-holes, when placed sufficiently high, might be made useful : a lady of rank and fashion, dressed for the rout, could perform the duties of a mother, while her carriage waited at the door, without any derangement of her garments. The title of this print is, " The fashionable mamma, or the convenience of a modern dress ; vide, The Pocket-hole, &c." If we believe numerous carica- tures published at this time, ladies who carried fashion to the extreme were not content with this paucity of covering, but they had it made of materials of such transparent texture, that they rivalled the celebrated cos- tume among the ancients of which Horace has told us " Co'is tibi pcene videre est, Ut nudam." In the caricatures of the spring of 1 796, we see through the thin frock the tie of the garter and the outlines of the body. We have already had to allude to a print of this date, in which the Tory Duchess of Gordon is represented in one of these transparent vests.* In a caricature by Gillray, entitled " Lady Godina's (for Godiva) Rout ; or, Peeping Tom spying out Pope Joan," alluding probably to some forgotten incident of * See p. 501. A FASHIONABLE MAMMA. LADY GEORGIANA GORDON. $ 4l the time, the duchess's daughter, Lady Georgiana Gordon shortly afterwards married to the Duke of Bedford, is repre- sented in the very height of fashion, with a vest more transparent even than we have here ventured to represent. The caricatures are of course con- siderably exaggerated, but they leave no room to doubt that the peculiarities which they ridicule were carried often to an extent that we should now have a difficulty in reconciling with pro- priety. Lady Georgiana's head-dress furnishes a good example of the fashionable turban and feathers, which, with most of the other characteristics of the costume of this period, continued more or less during this and the following year. To judge from many of these pictures of contemporary manners, the politeness of our countrymen during the French revo- lutionary period was not shewn very con- spicuously, except between those who were personally acquainted. A caricature, published by Gillray on the aist of _ \r , S j ,.,i j ,, TT- 1- >/~1U raK HEIGHT OP FASHION March, 1 796, and entitled " High Change IN , 7g6 in Bond Street ; or, la Politesse du Grande Monde," represents the fashionable loungers in that well- known promenade taking the pavement, while the ladies are obliged to walk in the gutter. One of these, seen from behind, represents a back view of the loose dress, and of the manner in which the hair was turned up over the turban. The caricatures on dress became less frequent after 1796, until 1799 and 1800, when they were again numerous. The principal change which had then taken place is the altered shape of the ladies' hats, which assume the form of a rounded bonnet, and the reappearance of the waist. The general dress of the ladies now approached nearer the natural form of the body, but there was still an outcry against its transparency, and it is represented as exhibiting distinctly to view the form of the limbs, and even the garters. Examples may be seen in a caricature by Gillray, entitled " Monstrosities of 1799 see Ken- sington Gardens," published on the 2j;th of June in that year, and in several others of the same date. It would appear, .54* MONSTR OSITIES. that this taste for transparencies vanished in the severe wintei which closed the year just mentioned, as a caricature, dated on the ^th of January, 1800, represents the ladies forced by the rigour of the weather to cover their bosoms, and adopt drawers and petticoats under their thin robes ; it is entitled " Boreas effecting what health and modesty could not do." The male costume among people of fashion had gone through a greater change during the last years of the eighteenth century, than that of the ladies. Among the " monstrosities" of the June of 1799, ' u the print already alluded to, is a beau in full dress. He wears large Hessian boots, with a coat of a new construction, buttoned close, and having high bunches on the shoulders ; he has a large high cravat, rising above the chin, and a hat approaching nearer in shape to those worn at the pre- sent day. This costume, which was ex- tremely ugly, was imported directly from France. The coat, perhaps from its inventor, was known by the name of a " Jean-de- Bry." If in former days of peace with France, which then under its King pos- sessed the most polite court in Europe, our countrymen cried out against the im- ,portation of French fashions, we need not be surprised if hey did the same now that the two coun- tries had been so long engaged in a war distinguished by bitter animosity on both sides, and when Englishmen had been taught to look upon our republican neighbours as models of everything that was barbarous. A caricature by Gillray, published on the 1 8th of November, 1 799, represents a " French tailor fitting John Bull with a Jean-de-Bry." The tailor is equipped in the detested bonnet rouge and its cockade, and appears delighted with his exploit. " A-ha ! dere, my friend, I fit you to de life ! dere is libertS ! no tight aristocratical sleeve to keep from you do vat you like ! a-ha ! begar ! dere be only want von leetel national cockade to make look quite a la mode de Paris !" Poor John, who stands in his great Hessian boots on a book of " Nouveaux Costumes," and has evidently no taste .for French liberty in any shape, exclaims in disgust, " Liberty ! A BACK VlKW. JOHN BULL NEW CLOTHED. 543 quoth'a ! why, zound, I can't move my arms at all ! for all it looks woundy big ! ah ! d n your French a la modes, they give a man the same liberty as if he was in the stocks ! Give me my old coat again, say I, if it is a little out at the elbows !" But John Bull's disgust availed little iu counteracting the infection of French example in this respect ; and in the very year when we were about to be terrified with the most extraordinary preparations for French invasion, our enemies sent us a costume which was uglier even than that last spoken of. Its distinguishing features were the coverings of the head, which con- sisted, in the one sex, of an enor- mous military cap, and in the other of a bonnet, probably of straw, of a very ungraceful form. They are represented in the ac- companying cut, taken from a caricature entitled, " Two of the Wigginses tops and bottoms of 1803," published on the 2nd of July in that year. The frivolity of manners and sentiments which gave rise from time to time to so much exaggera- tion of bad taste in dress, was no less frequently exhibited in the other paths of life, not only among the votaries of fashion, but through a large portion of society. Routs and balls had become objects of profuse extravagance ; masquerades were revived, and became again the fury of the day ; gambling and intriguing formed the chief occu- pation of immense numbers in all classes of society ; and novelty, however absurd, was the object of adoration of the multitude as well JOHN BULL TRANSF > it MED. ONB OF THE MON8TROSITIK8. 544 THE AIR-BALLOONS. THE MODE IN 1803. as of the select who gave the ton. London was never so full of strange sights ; and its population were never so ready to be gulled by them. It stands recorded in the newspapers of the time, on the pth of September, 1785, "Hand- bills were distributed this morning, that a bold adventurer meant to walk upon the Thames from Riley's Tea Gardens." We are further informed that at the hour appointed thousands of people had crowded to the spot, and the river was so thickly covered with boats, that it was no easy thing to find enough water uncovered to walk upon. The man evaded his promise in a dis- honest manner, and it was fortunate for him that the indignation of the multitude he had been the instru- ment of bringing together, did not lead them to open violence. In other fashionable amusements we seemed to be going back to the ages of the Eoman gladiators. It was at this period that Astley established his amphitheatre. One of the most remarkable fashions of this period was a sudden and extraordinary rage for ascending in balloons, which had been brought to a certain degree of perfection by some Frenchmen, for it was from France also that this mania was imported. It was at its height in England during the years 1784 and 1785. As early as the 2nd of December, 1783, when those aerial vehicles were newly come into notice, Horace Walpole writes, " balloons occupy senators, philosophers, ladies, everybody. France gave us the ton ; and, as yet, we have not come up to our model." They soon became the object of epigrams, satires, speculations, and even prophecies ; and people in joke, or in earnest, began to talk of scaling heaven in the face of day. An anonymous writer of a poem entitled, " The Air- balloon ; or, Flying Mortal," published in April 1784, rises from step to step till he concludes in the enthusiastic prospect ; "How few the worldly evils now I dread, No more confined this narrow earth to tread I Should fire or water spread destruction drear, Or earthquake shake this sublunary sphere, In air-balloon to distant realms I fly, And leave the creeping world to sink and die." BALLOON ASCENTS. 545 The invention was already giving rise to some apprehensions in France, for at the commencement of May a royal ordonnance forbad the construction or sending up of " any aerostatic machine," without an express permission from the king, on account of the various dangers attendant upon them, intimating however that these precautions were not intended to let this " sublime discovery" fall into neglect, but only to confine the experiments to the direction of intelligent persons. Blanchard was at this time the most distinguished and enterprising of the French aeronauts ; his third " aerial voyage," which took place on the 1 8th of July, 1784,* made a great noise in England, and was soon imitated. An Italian gentleman, named Luuardi, secretary to the Neapolitan embassy, is said to have been the first person who ascended in a balloon in this country; he left the Artillery Ground in London, in company with an English- man, at a quarter before two o'clock on Wednesday the i^th of September, 1784, and descended" in a field near Ware, in Hertfordshire, at about six o'clock in the evening. In October, Blanchard came to London, and ascended from Chelsea with an Englishman named Shellon, on the i6th of October. On the 1 2th of November, Mr. Sadler made the first of a numerous series of aerostatic voyages, starting from Oxford. It began now to be generally acknowledged that these locomotive FOLLY IN A NEW SHAPE. His first ascent hf-d taken place on the 2nd of March. The first ascent of a balloon in France occurred on the 1 1st of November, 1783. The ascenti in France during the year 1784 were very numerous, and excited interest even in England. HH 546 BALLOONS IN THE DECLINE. machines were so liable to accidents, that they were never likely to serve any useful purpose. Yet the fashion for them increased, and for several months they were the subject of continual papers in magazines and newspapers, besides giving rise to a number of pamphlets and prints, and a few caricatures. In one of the latter, the head of Folly occupies the place of the ball, with the inscription " The English Balloon, 1784," on the front of the cap. We may quote as another proof of the extra- ordinary share of public attention which these machines occupied, a successful farce, entitled " Aerostation ; or, the Templar's Stra- tagem," brought out at Covent Garden on the 2pth of October ; in it the passion of a lady of fortune for balloons, and her desire to ascend in one, was made to furnish a Templar with the occasion for a stratagem by which he eventually obtains her hand. The prologue to this piece thus declares the future advantages which were to arise from the popular discovery. " T make no doubt to entertain you soon With a new theatre in a stage-balloon. No more in garret high shall poets sit, With rival spiders spinning cobweb wit ; Like ancient barons future bards shall fare, In their own castles built up in the air ; Dull poets there behind a cloud shall stay, Whilst Fancy, darting to the source of day, Bold as an eagle, her career shall run, And with strong pinions fan the blazing sun." The chronicle of events given in the magazines of 1785, describes upwards of twenty remarkable balloon excursions made during that year, seven of which occurred in the month of May. Blanchard had crossed the Channel from Dover to France in a balloon, on the 7th of January. On the 7th of May, 17851 Walpole writes from London, " of conversation, the chief topic is air-balloons : a French girl, daughter of a dancer, has made a voyage into the clouds, and nobody has yet broken a neck, so neither good nor harm has hitherto been produced by these aerial enterprises." On the isth, Walpole adds, " Mr. Wind- ham, the member for Norwich, has made a voyage into the clouds, and was in danger of falling to earth, and being ship- wrecked. . . Three more balloons sail to-day ; in short, we shall have a prodigious navy in the air, and then what signifies having lost the empire of the ocean P" On the i^th of July, M. Rozier and another Frenchman, ascended from Boulogne, and their balloon taking fire at an immense elevation, the aeronauts were both thrown to the earth and killed. This disaster seemed to LORD KEXYON AND FARO'S DAUGHTERS. 547 have checked the passion for travelling in the air a little ; yet there were several ascents in this country in July, and an attempt was made to pass the Irish channel, which failed. They became less frequent during the following mouths, and by the next session they seem entirely to have lost their popularity, to make way for some new object of temporary excitement. No single vice was contributing so much to demoralize the nation as the passion for gaming, which ran through all ranks in society, but which was carried to an extraordinary pitch in the fashionable circles. It was well known that ladies of rank and fashion in the world associated together to support their private extravagance by seducing young men to the gambling table, and stripping them of their money in the manner profes- sionally termed " pigeoning." Faro-tables for this purpose were kept in the houses of some of the aristocracy. Three ladies in particular enjoyed this reputation, Lady Buckinghamshire, Lady Archer, and Lady Mount Edgcumbe, who from this circumstance became popularly known by the epithet " Faro's daughters." Numerous caricatures, among which are some of Gillray's happiest conceptions, have preserved the features and renown ot this cele- brated trio. Their infamous conduct had provoked in an especial degree the indignation of Lord Kenyon, who, on the pth of May, 1796, in summing up a case connected with gambling, and lamenting in forcible terms that that vice so deeply pervaded the whole mass of society, animadverted with great severity on the higher orders who set the pernicious example to their inferiors, adding, with some warmth, " They think they are too great for the law : I wish they could be punished ;" and then, after a slight pause, he added, " If any prosecutions of this nature are fairly brought before me, and the parties are justly convicted, whatever be their rank or station in the country though they should be the first ladies in the land they shall certainly exhibit themselves on the pillory*' If they escaped that pillory to which the angry judge had devoted them, there was another pillory which exposed these gaming ladies to equal scandal, if not to an equal punishment, and instead of being pilloried once, their ladyships stood for the public view, for weeks instead of hours, in the windows of every print-shop in the town. On the 1 2th of May, Gillray published a caricature entitled the " Exaltation of Faro's daughters," in which Ladies Buckingham- shire and Archer are placed side by side in the threatened pillory, exposed to a shower of mud and rotten eggs which testify the joy of the mob at their disgrace ; a placard stuck upon the pillory describes this process as a " Cure for gambling, H Nl 548 FARO'S DAUGHTERS IN THE PILLORY. published by Lord Kenyon in the Court of King's Bench, on May 9th, 1 796." An imitation of this print of Gillray appeared on the 1 6th of May, under the title of " Cocking the Greeks," in which the same ladies are similarly exposed, but the short and plump Lady Buckingham is obliged to stand on the tip of her toes upon her own faro-bank box to raise her J/T^* ^V^ ^-\_i nec k n a level with that of ^FxJ5 ~^P ^ \-3l wW| h er Caller companion ; Lord - Kenyon, in the character of public crier, is making his proclamation " Oh yes ! oh yes! this is to give notice that several silly women, in the parishes of St. Giles, St. James, and St. George, have caused much uneasiness and distress in ~1 families, by keeping bad LADIES OF ELEVATED RANK. ' ' "" L ^A ' ** M. fJ ' houses, late hours, and by shuffling and cutting have obtained divers valuable articles ; Whoever will bring before me " Lord Kenyon's threat, and the noise it then made abroad, seem to have had equally little effect on the patrician offenders to whom it was designed to serve as a warning. Other caricatures followed with as little success. One, published apparently about the beginning of 1797, represents these gambling dames " dividing the spoil," after a successful night, and compares them with a party of unfortunate women in St. Giles's, who are shewn in another compartment, sharing the various articles they have purloined from the pockets of their casual admirers. On one occasion, at the period just alluded to, Lady Buckingham- shire's faro-bank was stolen, while she and her party were closely occupied at their game. This circumstance produced a carica- ture by Gillray, entitled " The Loss of the Faro-bank," pub- lished on the and of February, 1 797, and gave rise to a mock heroic poem entitled " The Rape of the Faro-bank," which made its appearance about the same time. It was not long after this event that the offending ladies did fall into the power of their foe of the Bench. At the beginning of March, 1797, an infor- mation was laid against Lady Buckinghamshire, Lady E. Lut- terell, and some other ladies and gentlemen of rank, for keeoing THE AGE OF HIGHWAYMEN. 549 faro-tables in their houses ; and on the i ith of that month they were convicted of that offence, but Lord Kenyon seems to have forgotten his former threat, and he only subjected them to rather severe fines. This disaster furnished matter during several successive weeks to the newspapers for continual para- graphs, and the caricaturists took care to remind the judge of the disproportion between his present punishment and his former threat. In a caricature published on the 25th of March by Gillray, Lady Buckinghamshire is undergoing the punishment of being publicly flogged at the cart's tail, while two of her companions are suffering in the pillory in the distance ; over the cart a board is raised with the inscription, " Faro's daughters, beware." This print is entitled, " Disci- pline a la Kenyon." Another, published by the same artist on the i6th of May, is entitled "Faro's daughters, or the Ken- yonian blow up to the Greeks." Four ladies here figure in the pillory, and Fox (who it was said often made one of the gambling party), himself in the stocks, supports one of the sufferers on his shoulders. Lord Kenyon is busily occupied in burning the cards, dice, and faro-bank. The lesson this time seems to have been more effectual than the former, and we hear little of Faro's daughters after this scandal had passed away. The pernicious effects of the passion for gambling on society are but too evident in the manners and condition of the time. It was rapidly demoralizing all classes, and was accompanied everywhere with a general increase of crime, of which we evi- dently see but a small portion reported in the newspapers. Various pamphlets on the criminal statistics of the metropolis, shew us the alarming danger that existed, and the difficulty of grappling with it. The latter part of the eighteenth century was proverbially the age of highwaymen. On the 8th of September, 1782, Horace Walpole writes, " We are in a state of war at home that is shocking. I mean from the enormous profusion of housebreakers, highwaymen, and footpads; and, what is worse, from the savage barbarities of the two latter, who commit the most wanton cruelties. The grievance is so crying, that one dares not stir out after dinner but well armed. If one goes abroad to dinner, you would think one was going to the relief of Gibraltar." * Walpole repeats this complaint of the numbers and boldness of highwaymen not unfrequently during the following years ; in January, 1786, the mail was stopped in Pall Mall, close to the palace, and deliberately pillaged, at so * It was the time of the celebrated siege of Gibraltar, when that spot was so gallantly defended by General Eiliott. 550 REVIVAL OF THE MASQUERADES. early an hour as a quarter past eight in the evening. Walpole observes in continuation of the passage just cited, " You may judge how depraved we are, when the war has not consumed hall' the reprobates, nor press-gangs thinned their numbers ! But no wonder how should the morals of the people be purified, when such frantic dissipation reigns above them ? Contagion does not mount but descend." And he adds further, " a new theatre is going to be erected merely for people of fashion, that they may not be confined to vulgar hours that is to day or night." Previous to this, the masquerades, which were long dis- countenanced and forbidden by the Court, had been revived, by an evasion of the order against them. A German singer, named Teresa Cornelys, who had come to England in the latter years of the reign of George II., opened a kind of private opera in Soho square at the commencement of the reign of his successor, which was carried on until she was prosecuted by the manager of the Opera in the Haymarket, and compelled to close her house by the decision of a court of justice. Horace Wal- pole gives the following account of Mrs. Cornelys on the 22nd of February, 1771: "Our most serious war is between two operas. Mr. Hobart, Lord Buckingham's brother, is manager of the Haymarket. The Duchess of Northumberland, Lady Harrington, and some other great ladies, without a licence erected an opera at Madame Cornelys's. This is a singular dame j she sang here formerly by the name of Pompeiati. Of late years she has been the Heidegger of the age, and presided over our diversions. Her taste and invention in pleasures and decorations are singular. She took Carlisle House, in Soho Square, enlarged it, and established assemblies and balls by sub- scription. At first they scandalized, but soon drew in both righteous and ungodly. She went on building, and made her house a fairy palace, for balls, concerts, and masquerades. Her opera, which she called Harmonic Meetings, was splendid and cnarming. Mr. Hobart began to starve, and the managers of the theatres were alarmed. To avoid the Act, she pretended to take no money, and had the assurance to advertise that the subscription was to provide coals for the poor, for she has vehemently courted the mob, and succeeded in gaining their princely favour. She then declared her masquerades were for the benefit of commerce." Mrs. Cornelys's masquerades had made the greatest noise, and been most magnificent, during the year 1770: they were attended regularly by all the principal nobility and gentry in the kingdom, (as we are told, at CHARACTERS IN THE MASQUERADES. 551 each representation, by the newspapers of the day,) who went ha splendid dresses ; and one peculiarity was, that now all the masks acted up to their characters. On one occasion we learn that "Miss Monckton, daughter to Lord Gallway, appeared in the character of an Indian sultana, iu a robe of cloth of gold, and a rich veil. The seams of her habit were embroidered with precious stones, and she had a magnificent cluster of diamonds on her head : the jewels she wore were valued at thirty thousand pounds." Some notion may be formed of the sort of performance exhibited at these meetings from the following fragment of a newspaper report : " Miss G , in Leonora, looked charming ; she sang the favourite air in the ' Padlock' with great sweetness. The situation of her pretty tame bird was envied by many. Mr. Andrews, in the dress of the Calmuc Tartar, was taken great notice of; the character he supported extremely well. The lady run mad for the loss of her lover, was a character well sustained for some time ; but she soon recovered her senses ; no other madhouse could have administered more effectual remedies. The two jockeys, who pretended to be just arrived from Newmarket, were very little knowing in any respect, and seemed more calcu- lated for a country hop than the turf. The nurse with the child was rather diverting, but the brat very noisy and trou- blesome." Such remarks as these were continued through the whole assembly. On the 2/th of February, 1770, we are informed that " Some of the most remarkable figures were, a highlander (Mr. R. Conway) ; a double man, half miller, half chimney-sweeper (Sir R. Phillips) ; a political bedlamite, run mad for Wilkes and liberty and No. 45 ; a figure of Adam, in flesh-coloured silk, with an apron of fig-leaves ; a druid (Sir W. W. Wynne) ; a figure of somebody ; a figure of nobody ; a running footman, very richly dressed, with a cap set with diamonds, and the words 'Tuesday night's club' in the front (the Earl of Carlisle) ; his Royal Highness the Duke of Glou- cester in the old English habit, with a star on the cloak," &c. One of the grandest masquerades at the Soho rooms was that on the 7th of February, 1771, where two royal dukes, and nearly all the fashionable portion of the aristocracy, were present. Oil this occasion Colonel Luttrell (the same who had opposed Wilkes in the election for Middlesex,) appeared as a dead corpse in a shroud, with his coffin. The taste for political allusions at these assemblies gained ground, and they soon became veritable caricatures, not only upon society itself, but upon the event* of the day. At a masquerade in 1784, we are informed in the 55^ EVILS OF THE MASQUERADES. newspaper report, that " A figure representing Secret Influence, was well-drest, and seasonable in its point. He wore a black cloak, tied round with a girdle, labelled ' Secret Influence,' a double face, and a wooden temple on the top of his head. A ladder was painted down his back, entitled ' The back stairs.' He had a dark lantern in his hand ; but with all these accoutre- ments he was very dull ; he hardly opened his mouth, and when he did, he muttered some jargon in a whisper unintelligible to common ears ; but perhaps he was in character to speak in whispers, and his inefficacy was design. He was followed by Public Ruin, which also was well equipped, and very pitiable." One of the characters in a masquerade in 1774 was "a mad politician," who was covered with bills and acts of parliament ; "having lost the Boston port bill, he humorously accused Mr. Wedderburn of stealing it." These masquerades were professedly private meetings, and their pretended object was to raise money for the poor ; yet, in spite of the high rank of the people who attended them, great improprieties were allowed, and they led, under cover of the mask, to extraordinary licentiousness. Mrs. Cornelys was pro- secuted for giving masquerades without licence, in 1771 ; and in the same year bills of indictment were preferred against her by the grand jury of Middlesex, in which she is accused of " keeping and maintaining a common and disorderly house," and the fashionable company who frequented it are described as " divers loose, idle, and disorderly persons, as well men as women ! " whom she " did permit and suffer to be and remain during the whole night, rioting, and otherwise misbehaving themselves." So far, however, from the masquerades being checked by such scandal, it was at this time that the rival and splendifl Pantheon in Oxford Street (then called Oxford Koad) was opened, and for several years the two establishments emulated each other in magnificence and gaiety, although Mrs. Cornelys became involved in difficulties, and her establishment experienced a temporary interruption. The disorders of these assemblies seern, however, to have increased, and the public ear was continually offended with the scenes that took place in them. The want of delicacy in the fashionable company who chiefly supported Mrs. Cornelys had winked at the admission of loose women, and this was gradually carried to such an extent, that in the spring of 1772 it became the subject of so much scandal that it was found necessary to complain. In the following season the bench of bishops thought it their duty to interfere to put down the Pantheon DEGRADATION OF THE MASQUERADES. 553 masquerades, but a powerful intercession was made in their favour, and it was represented in this case also that their only object was the charitable one of raising money for the suffering poor. A caricature, representing the Macaronis petitioning the bishops in favour of the masquerades, entitled " The Pantheon Petition," was published with the Oxford Magazine in January, 1773. At a masquerade at the Pantheon on the i8th of February following, the number of people of rank and position in the world who attended was estimated at fourteen hundred. Yet during this and the following year the licentiousness of these mixed assemblies was carried to so alarming a height, that the very actors in them became gradually disgusted,* and they seemed to be rapidly going out of fashion. In 1776 Mrs. Cornelys re-opened Carlisle House in a style of extraordinary splendour, and the masquerades became as much the fashion as ever. In 1778, this lady, who had ruined herself by her exer- tions, was obliged to quit the management, which was carried on during another year unsuccessfully, and the masquerades at Carlisle House soon gave place to lectures and public assemblies of a totally different character. The European Magazine for July, 1/89, contains "An Elegy written in Soho Square, on seeing Mrs. Cornelys's House in ruins." Mrs. Cornelys herself was eventually reduced to a state of helpless poverty ; she died in the Fleet Prison in 1797. The masquerades continued to flourish at the Pantheon, and were given also at the Opera House, at Ranelagh, and in other places, but they became gradually more and more degraded in their moral character. One of the newspaper critiques on the masquerade at Carlisle House in February, 1779, laments gravely, " We were sorry to see such spirited exertions so poorly * The report of the masquerade at the Pantheon, in May, 1774, given in the Westmintter Magazine, (which was far from straight-laced in its morality,) observes, "The last masquerade has had different accounts given of it, according as individuals felt. But, as one entirely unprejudiced, I do pronounce it uncommonly dull, but more particularly before supper. The champaign made some eyes sparkle, which nothing else could brighten, though a deal of wanton love was exercised to effect purposes most base and dishonourable. The room was crowded with courtezans ; there was not a duenna in town who had not brought her Circassians to market ; ami, towards the conclusion of the debauch, I beheld scenes in the rooms up- stairs too gross for repetition. I saw ladies and gentlemen together in atti- tudes and positions that would have disgraced the court of Conius; ladies with their hair dishevelled, and their robes almost torn off. In short, I am so thoroughly sick of masquerading, from what I beheld there, that J do seriously decry them, as subversive of virtue, and every noble and domestic point of honour." 554 GENERAL PROFLIGACY IN MORALS. rewarded, as scarcely one person of distinction, or one file de joye of note, was present, to give a ton to the evening's enter- tainments." At length we read in the St. James's Chronicle of April 23, 1 795, the remark, that " No amusement seems to have fallen into greater contempt in this country than the mas- querades they have been lately mere assemblages of the idle and profligate of both sexes, who made up in indecency what they wanted in wit." The extreme Iicentiousnes3 which appears to have reigned amid these riotous amusements, and the still greater immorality to which they led, was, like the mania of the women for gamb- ling, only one shade of the general profligacy of this age. The shameless immorality which reigned among the higher classes in general, and which was propagated by example to the middle and lower classes, is but too evident in the popular writings of the day. The newspapers are full of advertisements offering means of indulgence. Instead of matrimonial advertisements, we meet with advertisements for mistresses ; and, to quote a particular example, in 1 794, the newspapers contain public advertisements of persons whose business it was to furnish means of concealing pregnancy and, when it could no longer be concealed, to deliver privately and dispose of the offspring so as to save the mother from scandal. The reign of George III. was especially the age of adultery in this country, which had really taken its place among the fashions of the day, and that crime had become almost a mania in the higher classes : there is, unfortunately, no want of evidence to prove that it was common enough in the middle and lower classes. In many cases, the trials laid open scenes of profligacy in high life of the most revolting character. Ineffectual efforts were made at different times to check this evil by placing difficulties in the way of divorce. In the spring of 1779, Shute Barrington, Bishop of Llandaff, introduced into the House of Lords a bill with the object of discouraging this crime, by fixing a brand of infamy on the adulteress that might operate as a terror upon the mind ; and he stated that as many divorces had occurred during the first seventeen years of the present reign as had taken place during the whole recorded history of the country :* the bill passed the Lords, but was thrown out in the House of Commons. Several similar attempts were made at different times ; and one of these, in 1798, drew the Bishop of Durham into a severe attack upon the dancers of the Opera. * Morals were infinitely worse in France : it is stated in the European Magazine for August, 1785, "Letters from Paris mention that there are no THE OPERA. 555 The Ope', a had lost somewhat of the novelty which it had possessed under George II., and for a while it seemed to be almost eclipsed by the popularity of Carlisle House and the Pantheon. Foreign singers no longer attracted that extraor- dinary worship which had been bestowed on them formerly, and towards the end of the century the managers seemed to have aimed at moving the passions of the audience by the small quantity of apparel which was allowed to the danseuses, and the freedom with which they exposed their forms to public view. An English dancer, Miss Rose, who joined to a very plain face an extremely elegant figure and graceful movement, enjoyed great reputation in 1 796, and seems to have led the new fashion for this kind of exhibition. A caricature picture of her by Gillray, published on the i2th of April, 1796, bears the motto, " No flower that blows is like this Rose." On the fifth of May following, Gillray caricatured this new style of dancing in a caricature entitled, " Modern Grace ; or, the Opera- tical finale to the ballet of Alonzo e caro." On the 2nd of March, 1798, there was a debate in the House of Lords on a divorce bill, in the course of which the Bishop of Durham took 'occasion to complain of the frequency of such bills, and laid the fault upon the French government, who, he said, sent agents into this country on purpose to corrupt our manners : " He considered it a consequence of the gross immoralities imported of late years into this kingdom from France, the Directory of which country, finding that they were not able to subdue us by their arms, appeared as if they were determined to gain their ends by destroying our morals, they had sent over persons to this country, who made the most indecent exhibitions in our theatres." He added, that it was his intention to move, on some future day, that an address be presented to his Majesty, beseeching him to order all such dancers out of the kingdom, as people who were likely to destroy our morality and religion, and "who were very probably in the pay of France !" This appeal, seems to have produced some interference of authority ; for on the very next night, Saturday, the 3rd of March, the ballet of Bacchus and Ariadne, which was to have been per- formed at the Opera House, was postponed, and another substi- tuted, until other dresses could be prepared. The improvement, as we learn from the newspaper reports, consisted in substituting less tban four hundred divorces pending before the Parliament ; and eight hundred more before the Chatelet. A striking proof to what a height the corruption of morals is arrived in that kingdom." This must be set down as cue of the true precursors of the revolution, which so soon followed. 556 THE DANSE A L'EVEQUE. white stockings for flesh-coloured silk, and in adding a certain quantity of drapery above and below. The change made no little noise abroad, and was the subject of abundance of ridicule ; the bishops and the opera-dancers figured together in numerous caricatures. In one by Gillray, published on the 1 4th of March, a group of danseuses are made to conceal a portion of their personal charms by adopting the episcopal apron ; it is entitled " Operatical reform ; or, la Danse a I'Eveque" and is accom- panied with the following lines : " 'Tis hard for such new-fangled orthodox rules, That our opera troop should be blamed ; Since, like our first parents, they only (poor fools !) Danced naked and were not ashamed." The figure to the right will be recognised as that of Miss Kose. Another ca- ricature by Gillray, publi shed on the i gi h of March, and en- titled " Ecclesiasti- cal Scrutiny; or, the Durham Inquest on Duty," represents the bishops attend- ing at the dressing of the opera girls, where one is mea- suring the length of their petticoats with a tailor's yard, an- other is arranging their stockings in THE DANSE A I/EVEQUB. the Ie3st graceful manner possible, and a third is giving directions for the form of their stays. Amongst others on the same subject, one of the best is entitled " Durham Mustard too powerful for Italian capers ; or the Opera in an uproar," and represents the bishop armed with his pastoral staff rushing on the stage to encounter the spirit of the evil one embodied in bare legs and open bosoms. How long the episco- pal censure kept the opera in order we are not told ; but the rage for opera dancing increased under the influence of Vestris. The regular drama, in the meantime, continued to hold the elevated position given to it by Garrick, and a number of actors SUCCESS OF PIZARKO. 557 of first-rate talent drew constant audiences to the theatres. It would take too much room in a slight sketch like this even to allude to the various petty squabbles and rivalries of actors and managers during this long reign, or to the numerous pamphlets of different kinds to which they gave rise, and which deserve only to be forgotten. Drury Lane flourished under the pro- prietorship of Sheridan, and with the dramas which have given celebrity to his name, while it enabled him in more ways than one to support his position as a statesman, although his thought- less extravagance often drained its resources, and sometimes clogged the regular movement of the company. In the Sep- tember of 1788, John Kemble became the stage-manager, and gave strength to the company. On the extraordinary success of the tragedy of "Pizarro" in 1799, the Tory party seem to have attributed it in great part to Kemble's acting ; and a cari- cature, published with the Anti-Jacobin Review on the ist of October, represents Sheridan in the character of Pizarro borne through upon Kem- ble's head. Gillray had published a ca- ricature on the 4th of June, entitled " Pi- zarro contemplating over the product of his new Peruvian mine," which repre- sents Sheridan exult- ing over his newly- acquired riches. The popularity of this play was so great, that it produced a number of pamphlets relating to its hero, and made multitudes read the history of Peru who had never thought of it before. The performances at Drury Lane seem to have been falling in interest and in pecu- niary productiveness, when, on the jjth of December, 180,3, a "serio-comic romance" was brought out under the title of " The Caravan," the chief characteristic of which was the introduction on the stage of real water and of a large Newfoundland dog, which was made to rush into it and drag out the figure of a child. A contemporary criticism tells us that " the main object oi the author seems to have been to produce novelty, and, through novelty to excite surprise. The introduction of real water BHEIUDA.N UPON KESIBLB. 558 THE INFANT BOSCIU8. flowing across the stage, and a dog acting a principal part, chiefly attracted attention, and seemed amply to gratify curi- osity." This piece, in spite of the puerility of the idea, had an extraordinary run, and, to use the words of the critic just quoted, was "very productive to the treasury." The Tory opponents of Sheridan as a politician represented this as a well- timed and very necessary relief; and Sayer, in a large caricature published on the i /th of December, represents the dog Carlo, in his artificial pond on the stage, holding Sheridan's head above water. It is inscribed, " The Manger and his Dog ; or, a new way to keep one's head above water, a Farce performed with rapturous applause at Drury Lane Theatre. Motto for the Farce, 'And Folly clapped his hands and Wisdom stared.' " Thalia, on a pedestal, is represented weeping at the prostitution of the drama. The Drury Lane company appears to have been now under the frequent necessity of having recourse to expedients of this kind to catch popular favour. The year 1805 witnessed the extraordinary sensation produced by the " infant Roscius," (Master Betty), who was brought on the stage at Drury Lane when only twelve years of age. The extraordinary sums of money which this child produced were an important assist- ance at this moment to Sheridan, who made the most of his good fortune. His political op- ponents were loud %. their declamations against " The The- atrical Bubble," a title under which G-illray published a cari- cature on the 7th of January, 1805, in which he represented Sheridan as Punch on the boards of old Drury, with a few addi- tional gems added to his ruby nose from the profits of his the- atrical treasury, blowing the bubble which had replenished it, and surrounded by some of his friends who had been loudest in their patronage of the prodigious infant, among whom we easily recognise Lord Derby, Lord Carlisle, Mrs. Jordan, and her admirer the Duke of Clarence. A BUBBLE. n ' i t. Fox is expressing somewhat boisterously his joy at the success of his political friend. COVENT GARDEN THEATRE REBUILT. 559 This appears to have been the most prosperous period of Sheridan's finances. On the 24th of February, 1809, Drury Lane theatre was burnt to the ground, while Sheridan was at his post in the House of Commons. With it ended his theatri- cal and parliamentary prospects. Govent Garden theatre had been involved in the same calamity only a few months before, on the morning of Tuesday the 1 9th of September, 1808, and was now in rapid progress of rebuilding. Its reopening led to the most extraordinary theatrical riots that this country has ever witnessed. John Kemble had left Drury Lane to become part proprietor and manager of Covent Garden, where he made his first appearance on the 24th of September, 180.3. Kemble was unpopular with all but the aristocratic portion of his audience, to whom exclu- sively he was accused of paying his court. He is said to have been proud and authoritative in his bearing towards others, and to have given disgust by the affectation which was exhibited in his manners, language, and even in his acting. An amusing instance of this was shewn in the obstinacy with which he con- tended that the word ache should be pronounced as if written aitche, and in the pertinacity with which he held himself to that pronunciation. In a sketch of the history of Covent Garden in the same number of the Examiner which contains the* account of the burning of the theatre, the writer expresses the popular sentiments in his concluding observation : " From the general tenour of his management, I am sorry that instead of con- cluding this brief chronicle with the customary ' whom God long preserve ! ' it will be much more congenial to the wishes of the town to hope that, as a stage-manager, Mr. Kemble may be speedily removed." Immediately after the destruction of the theatre by fire, Kemble solicited a subscription to rebuild it, which was speedily filled up, the Duke of Northumberland, to whose son he had given instruction in elocution, contributing the handsome dona- tion of ten thousand pounds. Gillray has commemorated this circumstance in a caricature entitled, " Theatrical Mendicants relieved," in which the manager of Covent Garden theatre is represented in garments all tattered and torn, seeking charity at the door of Northumberland House. The first stone of the new building was laid with great ceremony by the Prince of Wales, (as grand master of the British free-masons,) on the last day of the year 1808, and it was completed with such rapidity, that on the i8th of September, 1809, it was opened with Macbeth, Kemble himself appearing in the character of Macbeth. In the new arrangement of the hall, a row of 560 THE O. P. RIOTS. private boxes formed the third tier under the gallery ; they were twenty-six in number, with a private room behind each, and the access was by a staircase exclusively appropriated to them, with an exclusive lobby also, having no communication with the other parts of the house. The furniture of each box and of the adjoining room, was to be according to the taste of the several occupants. To make these extraordinary accommodations for the great, the comforts of the rest of the audience were considerably diminished, especially in the other tiers of boxes, and the gallery, and one part was reduced to a little better than a row- of pigeon-holes. To crown all, the theatre opened with an increase of the prices, the pit being raised from three shillings and sixpence to four shillings, and the boxes from six shillings to seven shillings. The manager said that this was necessary to cover the great expense of rebuilding the theatre ; but the public were not satisfied with this explanation : they declared that the old prices were sufficient, and that the new ones were a mere exaction to contribute to Kemble's private extravagance, to enable him to pay enormous salaries to foreigners, like Madame Catalani, (who had been engaged at one hundred and fifty pounds a week to perform two nights only,) and to pander to the lujcury of the rich. The popular belief in the extreme profligacy of the higher classes, led people to figure to them- selves that the rooms attached to the private boxes were to be used for the most shameful purposes, and they accused the manager of having built a bagnio instead of a theatre. On the first night of representation, which was Monday, the curtain drew up to a crowded theatre, and the audience seemed to be lost in admiration at the beauty of the decorations, until Kemble made his appearance on the stage in the character of Macbeth ; a faint attempt at applause, got up by his own friends, was in an instant drowned by an overpowering noise of groans, hisses, yells, and every species of vocal power that could be conjured up for the occasion, which drove him from the stage, after two or three vain attempts to proceed, and which was redoubled every time he made an attempt to return. Mrs. Siddons then came forward, but met with no better reception than her brother. The performance was, however, persevered in, but the uproar continued through the whole of the evening, and was continued to a late hour. It was understood that Kemble had declared that he would not give in to the popular clamour, and had anticipated that if it was allowed to take its course, it would soon wear itself out. But the next night, and the nights following, it was continued with greater fury than JOHN BULL AGAINST JOHN EEMBLE. 561 ever, and to the voice were now added a multitude of cat-calls, horns, trumpets, rattles, and a variety of other instruments of discordant music. An attempt at intimidation served only to increase the exasperation of the audience. On Wednesday night, the manager came forward to address the audience, and attempted to make a justification of his conduct, which was not accepted ; on Friday he presented himself again, and proposed that the decision of the dispute should be put to a committee composed of the governor of the Bank of England, the attorney general, and a few other great names. On Saturday night this was agreed to, and the theatre was shut up till the decision was obtained, the obnoxious Catalani having, in the meantime, agreed to cancel her engagement. On the following Wed- nesday the theatre was reopened, but the report of the com- mittee being of a very unsatisfactory kind, for it was believed that the whole was a mere trick to gain time, in hopes that the excitement would subside, the uproar became greater than ever. The manager, who was determined to vanquish the popular feeling, is said to have hired a great number of boxers, and on the Friday night following the various pugilistic contests in the pit gave it the appearance of a regular boxing-school. Bow- street officers were also called in, but they appear to have acted indiscreetly, and the only effect of this appeal to violence was to fill the police-offices with cases of assault and riot, the result of which added fuel to the flame, which it appeared totally impossible to extinguish. The rioters, who appear to have been acting under the guidance of people of education and talent, did not restrict themselves to mere noise. They said it was John Bull against John Kemble, and they were determined that John Bull should have the mastery. As no expression of sentiments could be heard amid the uproar, they stuck up placards, and raised banners all over the house, covered with proverbs, lampoons, and encouragements to persevere, written in large characters, and to these were soon added large painted caricatures. In the latter Kemble was figured hanging, or fixed in the pillory, or in some other ignominious position. The private boxes, and those who came to occupy them, were the especial objects of abuse, and the theatre was filled with placards, inscribed, " No private boxes for intrigues!" "No private boxes with sofas!" "No crim. con. boxes ! " These were mixed with numerous others, of the most licentious description, and large pictures of such a character that it was impossible for any respectable woman to remain in the theatre a moment. The consequence of this o o 562 GOD SAVE JOHN BULL. was, that very few attended except those who took part in the riot, and the part of the theatre which contributed most to the treasury was nearly empty. Songs were also made for the occasion ; and the following parody on the national anthem wsa especially popular : " God save great Johnny Bull, Long live our noble Bull, God save John Bull 1 Make him uproarious, With lungs like Boreas, Till he's victorious, God save John Bull ! " O Johnny Bull, be true, Oppose the prices new, And make them fall I Curse Kemble's politics, Frustrate his knavish tricks, On thee our hopes we fix, Confound them all ! " No private boxes let Intriguing ladies get, Thy right, John Bull I From little pigeon-holey Defend us jolly souls, And we will sing, by Golet I God save John Bull I" There was much satire expended on Kemble, and his " ditches " were turned to ridicule in every possible manner. Many of the placards were extremely humorous, and these, with the jokes and squibs that passed thickly about, helped to keep up the spirit of the riot, while songs and caricatures circulated freely about the town, Badges, consisting of the letters 0. P. (old prices), in large characters, were worn at the theatre, at first cut in pasteboard, but afterwards formed in metal, and some even in silver. Medals were also struck, and distributed about. One of these, now before me, represents on the obverse the head of Kemble, wearing a fool's cap, and accom- panied with a penny-trumpet and a rattle ; above it is the inscription, " Oh, my head aitches /" and below the word, "Obsti- nacy !" The reverse bears the letters O. P. in the centre, surrounded with the inscrip- tion, "John Bull's Jubilee Clifford for o p MEDAL " cver '" ^ ne allusion is to the jubilee, to celebrate the completion of the fiftieth MEDALS AND PLACARDS. 563 year of the King's reign, and to a barrister of the name of Clifford, who was understood to be the chief leader of the riot. , This profuse exhibition of placards was quite a novelty] in theatrical rioting. One of the placards in the month of October was inscribed, " A row for our rights to be continued for forty nights," but the uproar seemed likely to be carried on for ever. It soon took a form quite regular and systematic : the play was heard with few interruptions till half-price ; the boxes, especially the private ones, were nearly empty, and even the pit was almost deserted. At half-price the rioters rushed in, the placards were raised, the uproar commenced, and all that passed on the stage afterwards was mere pantomime. At the conclusion, the audience rose and sang " God save the King!" had a dance in the pit, gave three groans for John Kemble, then three cheers for John Bull, and so dispersed. Sometimes the uproar was continued in the streets, and in more than one instance it was carried to Kemble's house, and he was himself mobbed and insulted. This was continued night after night, with scarcely any interruption, not for weeks only, but for more than three months. During this period everything distinguished by the epithet O. P. became fashionable. There was an " O. P. dance." The most active agent of the managers against the rioters, and, therefore, the most unpopular with them, was the box-keeper, Mr. Brandon. He had caused Clifford to be arrested on slight grounds, and the latter brought an action against him for damages, and obtained a verdict against him in the Court of Common Pleas on the ^th of December. Gillray on that day published a caricature entitled " Counsellor O. P. -defender of your theatric liberties," in which Clifford is re- presented holding a torch behind him, and looking on while Covent Garden Theatre is in flames. The verdict against Brandon gave new courage to the opponents of the new prices ; and finding it utterly impossible to appease them in any other way, Kemble at length gave up the contest. A public dinner of the more respectable of the O. P. agitators was held on the 1 4th of December at the Crown and Anchor, at which no less than five hundred persons are said to have attended, and Kemble came in person to make an apology for his conduct, and announce his willingness to accede to any compromise that should be agreeable to them. After dinner there was a crowded theatre, and amid considerable uproar, a humble apology was accepted from the manager, and it was agreed that the private boxes should be reduced to the same number which existed in 1802; that the pit should be reduced to its original price o o a 564 SHERIDAN LEAVES DRURY LANE. of 3*. 6d., but that the price of admission to the boxes should remain at 7*. ; that the obnoxious Mr. Brandon should be dismissed (at least he was compelled to resign his place) ; that- all prosecutions and actions on both sides should be abandoned ; and that Kerable should make a public apology for having introduced improper persons into the theatre. The last article referred to the boxers and police. After all these demands had been complied with, a large placard was unfurled, containing the words, " We are satisfied," and at the conclusion of the play the pit gave three cheers for Clifford. Thus ended this extraordi- nary contest. A theatrical reconciliation dinner was given on the 4th of January, 1810, at which both parties attended, and at which Clifford was placed in the chair. Drury Lane theatre was also rebuilt by subscription, under the directions of Mr. Whitbread, who agreed that Sheridan should receive 20,000 for his moiety of the property, with an addi- tional 4000 for the property of the fruit-offices and reversion of boxes and shares, in consideration of which he was to have no connexion whatever with the new undertaking. Many com- plained of the manner in which Whitbread thus thrust Sheridan out of the proprietorship which had so long supported him to be an ornament of the legislative assembly of the nation, while others exulted in his overthrow. A carica- ture, published in the October of 1 8 1 1 , when the new theatre was completed, and these stipulations put in force, is entitled, " Clearing away the rubbish of Old Drury," and represents Whit- bread in the character of a brewer's man wheeling away Sheri- dan in a barrow among a heap of old bricks. Sheridan is made to exclaim (in allusion to his peculiarly persuasive eloquence), " Hope told a flattering tale d n that brewer and his entire, he has washed me out with only 20,000, but I know how to palaver them over, and get in again." The general taste for the drama had certainly increased CLKAKING AWAY RUBBISH. THE PIC-NICS. 565 towards the end of the last century, and it was evinced in the new fashion for private performances among the aristocracy. The houses where this fashion was indulged in with greatest splendour, were Wynnstay, the seat of Sir W. W. Wynne ; Wargrave, the seat of Lord Barrymore ; and Crewe Hall, near Chester. The parties at Wynnstay were especially distin- guished for their elegance. At the commencement of the century, a society of private, or, as they termed themselves, " dilettanti " actors, was formed in London, and assumed the name of the Pic-Nic Society, from the manner in which they were to contribute mutually to the general entertainment. That old meteor of London fashion, Lady Albina Buckinghamshire, is understood to have been the originator of this scheme, in which, besides the performance of farces and burlettas, there were to be feasts and ridottos, and a variety of other fashionable amuse- ments, each member drawing from a silk bag a ticket which was to decide the portion of entertainment which he was expected to afford. The performances took place in rooms in Tottenham- street. This harmless piece of fashionable amusement produced a greater sensation than it is now possible to conceive. The populace had been so long accustomed to hear of aristocratic depravity, that they could understand nothing private in high life without attaching to it ideas of licentiousness, and there was a notion that the Pic-Nic Society implied some way or other an attack upon public morals. Complaints were made against it which led almost to a pamphlet war. The professional theatri- cals were angry and jealous, because they thought that the aristocratic love of theatrical amusements, which had supported them in their exertions, would evaporate in private parties. Nearly the whole periodical press attacked the Pic-Nics with- out mercy, and the daily papers teemed with abuse and scandal. They were ridiculed and caricatured on every side. Gillray produced no less than three caricatures on the Pic-Nics. The first of these, published on the 2nd of April, 1802, soon after the society had been established, is entitled " Blowing up the Pic- Nics ; or Harlequin Quixotte attacking the Puppets, vide, Tot- tenham Street Pantomime." The Pic-Nic party are represented as puppets in the midst of their festivities, which are disturbed by the attack of the infuriated actors, among whom we recog- nise Kemble, Siddons, Billington, &c., led by Sheridan, who, dressed as harlequin, rushes to the assault, armed with the pen of the Post, Chronicle, Herald, Evening Courier, &c., whose attacks he is supposed to have directed agaiust them. In another of Gillray's caricatures, entitled "The Pic-Nic Or 566 THE SHAKSPEARE MANIA. chestra," the noble and fashionable performers are represented on duty. A third caricature, published on the i8th of Feb- ruary, 1803, is entitled "Dilettanti Theatricals, vide Pic-Nic Orgies ;" it represents the motley group dressing for the stage, and is full of humour, with a considerable sprinkling of licen- tiousness. At this latter date the society seems to have been already sinking under the load of obloquy and ridicule to which it was exposed, and before the year was out the regular theatricals were relieved from any jealousy that such attempts might excite. During the whole of our present period, the managers of the two principal theatres continued to exert themselves in making Shakspeare popular on the stage, and for some time with success. Garrick had done most of any to bring the bard into fashion, and the Stratford Jubilee in 1769 had raised an abso- lute Shakspeare mania. This new fashion had also exhibited itself in the extensive study of Shakspeare's writings, and in the extraordinary number of new editions that succeeded each other. Annotator followed annotator, and the text of the poet seemed in danger of being torn to pieces amid Shakspeare ad- mirers and Shakspeare disputes. The following ballad, from the Westminster Magazine for October, 1773, gives rather an amusing and not an inaccurate enumeration of the Shakspeare editors who had succeeded each other previous to that period : " SHAKSPEARE'S BEDSIDE. " Old Shakspeare was sick ; for a doctor he sent ; But 'twas long before any one caine ; Yet, at length, his assistance Nic Howe* did present : Sure all men have heard of his name. " As he found that the poet had tumbled his bed, He smooth'd it as well as he could ; He gave him an anodyne, comb'd out hia head, But did his complaint little good. " Doctor Pope to incision at once did proceed, And the bard for the simples be cut ; For bis regular practice was always to bleed, Ere the fees in his pocket he put. " Next Tibbald advanced,t who at best was a quack, And dealt but in old woman's stuff ; Yet he caused the physician of Twick'nham to pack, And the patient grew cheerful enough. * Nicholas Rowe was the first editor of Shakspeare ; his edition appeared in seven volumes in 1709-10. t Theobald's edition of Shakspeare was first printed in 1 733, and was often reprinted. After all that has been done to the text since, it is one of' the best editions, in spite of the character our ballad- writer here gives hii~. SHAKSPEARE'S BEDSIDE. 567 " Nert Hanmer,* who fees ne'er descended to crave, In gloves lily-white did advance ; To the poet the gentlest of purges he gave, And, for exercise, taught him to dance. * One Warburton then, though allied to the church, Produced his alterative stores ; But his med'cines the case so oft left in the lurch, That Edwardsf kicked him out of doors. " Next Johnson arrived to the patient's relief, And ten years he had him in hand ; But, tired of his task, 'tis the general belief He left him before he could stand. " Now Capell drew near not a quaker more prim And number' d each hair in his pate ; By styptics, called stops, he contracted each limb, And crippled for ever his gait. " From Gopsal then strutted a formal old goose, And he'd cure him by inches, he swore ; But when the poor poet had taken one dose, He vow*d he would swallow no more. " But Johnson, determin'd to save him or kill, A second prescription display'd ; And that none might find fault with his drop or his pill, Fresh doctors he call'd to his aid. " First, Steevens came loaded with black-letter books, Of fame more desirous than pelf ; Such reading, observers might read in his looks, As no one e'er read but himself. " Then Warner, by Plautus and Glossary known, And Hawkins, historian of sound ; Then Warton and Collins together came on, For Greek and potatoes renown 'd. " With songs on his pontificalibus pinn'd, Next Percy the great did appear ; And Fanner, who twice in a pamphlet had sinn'd, Brought up the empirical rear. " ' The cooks the more numerous, the worse is the broth,' Says a proverb I well can believe ; And yet to condemn them untried I am loth, So at present shall laugh in my sleeve.' " It was this rage for everything Shakspearian that brought into existence those forgeries of William Henry Ireland, so well * Sir Thomas Hanmer's handsome edition was published at Oxford in I744- ( " One Edwards, an apothecary, who appears to have known more of the poet's case than some of the regular physicians who undertook to cure him." Thomas Edwards published, in 1748, what is described as a Supple- ment to Warburton's Shakspeare, under the title of " The Canons of Cri- ticism aud Glossary." 568 THE SHAKSPEARE PAPER8. known as the Shakspeare manuscripts. The history of the pre- tended discovery of these papers was in substance closely similar to the story fabricated by Chatterton for his Rowley Papers, and indeed to that of all other literary frauds of the same de- scription. A few documents were first produced, as having been found among old family deeds, and the success of these led to the production of others. These the inventor first shewed to his father, Samuel Ireland, so well known by his illustrations of Hogarth and other works, and by him they were communicated to others, and a number of men of high literary character, such as Dr. Parr, Dr. Warton (who had previously believed in the Rowley Papers), Boswell, Erskine, and others, declared their full belief in their authenticity. In 1796, a substantial folio was published, containing miscellaneous papers and legal instru- ments, under the hand and seal of William Shakspeare, with the tragedy of "Lear" and a fragment of " Hamlet," from the original manuscript. This work caused the most extraordinary sensation, and scarcely anything else was talked of, not only in the literary world, but among society in general. But Malone, Steevens, and others, who were more critically acquainted with the writings of the great poet, at once pronounced all these documents as forgeries, and Malone published a volume, ad- dressed to Lord Charlemont, exposing the fraud. Before this exposure came out, young Ireland had proceeded another step in the plot, for he produced a play entitled " Vortigeru," as an un- known work of Shakspeare, which had been found among the same papers, and he took it to Sheridan for representation at Drury Lane. Sheridan made no pretensions to antiquarian knowledge; he expressed some surprise at the mediocrity of many parts of the play, but he said that it was evidently an ancient manuscript, and he thought that the public excitement on the subject might justify his bringing it forward at Drury Lane. The night fixed for the representation of "Vortigern" was the 2nd of April, 1796, and it was supported by all the talent of John and Charles Kemble, Mrs. Jordan, Mrs. Powell, and the other best actors of the company. Malone's critique on the nrinted papers had appeared before this performance, and, to counteract it, a declaration of their authenticity was produced, signed by a number of distinguished but credulous persons, with Dr. Parr at their head ; and a handbill was distributed at the door and in the theatre, designating Malone's "Inquiry" as " a malevolent and impotent attack," and promising a prompt and satisfactory reply. A prologue had been written by Pye, the VORTIGERN. 569 poet laureate, which seemed to insinuate a doubt of the fact of Shakspeare being the author, and this was therefore laid aside, to make place for one written by Sir James Bland Surges, which, read by Mr. Whitfield (who is said to have been too flurried to speak it), commenced with a bold assertion that the piece about to be acted was the work of Shakspeare, and de- manded the attention of the audience to it as such : " No common cause your verdict now demands, Before the Court immortal Shakspeare stands That mighty master of the human soul, Who rules the passions, and, with strong control, Through every turning of the changeful heart Directs his course sublime, and leads bis powerful art" The theatre was crowded with an immense and anxious audience, who, after a few scenes, disgusted with the poverty of the play, began to express their dissatisfaction in no equivocal manner. About the beginning of the fourth act, Kemble came forward, and, begged they would hear it through with candour; and it was then allowed to go on ; but the proposal to give it for repetition was received with such loud and universal disapproba- tion, that it was not persevered in. An epilogue, delivered by Mrs. Jordan, spoke not of the piece which had been acted, but called upon the sympathy of the audience in general terms for Shakspeare, compared the characters of the old drama with those of the present day, and ended with a faint appeal to their indulgence : " "Ha true, there is some change, I must confess, Since Shakspeare' s time, at least in point of dress. The ruffs are gone, and the long female waist Yields to the Grecian more voluptuous taste ; While circling braids the copious tresses bind, And the bare neck spreads beautiful behind. Our senators and peers no longer go, Like men in armour, glittering in a row ; But for the cloak and pointed beard we note The close-cropt head and little short great-coat. Yet is the modern Briton still the same, Eager to cherish, and averse to blame, Foe to deception, ready to defend, A kind protector, and a generous friend." The result of the performance at Drury Lane sealed the fate of the Shakspeare manuscripts. Those who had stood forward in their defence, became objects of ridicule for their ready credulity, and at the end of the year the public indignation was moved by the effrontery of William Henry Ireland, who pub- 570 THE SHAKSPEARE GALLERY. lished a full confession of the forgery, and joined in the ridicule cast on Dr. Parr, Warton, and others. Samuel Ireland, the father, now came forward, to disavow any complicity in the affair, and declare that he had been a dupe equally with others. The question continued to agitate the public during the whole of the year 1797, and on the first of December, Gillray published a portrait of the author of the fraud, under the title of " Noto- rious Characters, No. t," with the following lines, said there to be written by Mason (but OH better authority attributed to Steevens), comparing the four great literary forgers of the age, Lauder, Macpherson, Chatterton, and W. H. Ireland : " Four forgers, born in one prolific age, Much critical acumen did engage. The first was soon by doughty Douglas scared, Though Johnson would have screen'd him, had he dared ; The next had all the cunning of a Scot ; The third, invention, genius, nay, what not ? Fraud, now exhausted, only could dispense To her fourth son their three- fold impudence." . The popularity of Shakspeare had, in another quarter, acted in a very different manner, and produced an influence upon native art which, whatever the jealousy of that age may have said, must ever render the name of Alderman Boydell an object of grateful remembrance to posterity. He had come to London a young man at a time when engraving was at so low an ebb in this country, that all our good prints were imported from abroad, and, first as an engraver, and subsequently as a print-dealer, he laboured with so much success, that at the end of his career the exportation of English engravings far exceeded the number of foreign ones imported. Not content with patronizing engraving, Boydell conceived a plan for patronising native art in painting ; and he aspired to raise an English school of historical painters which should rival by its works the celebrity of the ancient masters. Seizing on the popular object of adoration, he em- ployed the first English artists of the age, at high prices, in painting compositions illustrative of the works of the bard of Avon. Sir Joshua Reynolds, as well as West, Barry, Fuseli, Northcote, Opie, Smirk, and all the chief painters of the time, contributed to the celebrated Shakspeare Gallery, which was open for exhibition in 1789, and had for its professed object to establish an English school of historical painting. Subscribers were at the same time received for a splendid series of engravings illustrative of Shakspeare's plays. Many, however, appear to have been jealous of BoydelFs efforts, which they represented as THE WORSHIPPER OF AVARICE. 571 the mere schemes of an avaricious man to gather money into his own private treasury. Gillray entered into this feeling in a truly magnificent caricature, entitled " Shakspeare Sacrificed; or, the Offering to Avarice," published on the 2oth of June, 1789. The genius of Avarice, the object of Boydell's adoration, is seated aloft on a ponderous volume, entitled " List of Sub- scribers to the Sacrifice," which is supported on portfolios of the works of " Modern Masters ;" he grasps in his arms two bags of money, and an imp on his shoulder, with peacock's feathers for hair, is blowing the bub- ble " immortality" with a pipe. Within the magic circle, surrounding the object of his worship, Boydell stands by a fire, into which he is casting the tattered fragments of Shakspeare's works, in the smoke of which, as it rises towards heaven, we see exaggerated sketches of some of the more remarkable designs which his gallery had brought together. Outside the circle, the portfolio of the " Ancient Masters" lies neglected on the ground, and a snail is seen THJ GEimj8 OF crawling slowly over it. In the distance, Fame is blowing away the great bubbles of former days, while he scatters around him a shower of puffs from the Morning Herald and other papers, as the only effectual instru- ments of fame in modern times. Boydell's opponents, indeed, accused him not only of puffing, but of resorting to all kinds of expedients to call public atten- tion to his Gallery. In the spring of 1791, it appears that an evil-minded person had gained admission for the purpose of damaging some of the pictures, and a malicious report was set abroad that Boydell himself was the perpetrator of this act of Vandalism. Gillray, who was no friend to the Shakspeare Gallery, published, on the z6th of April, a caricature portrait of the alderman in the act of mutilating his pictures ; and, in allusion to a malefactor of the name of Ren wick Williams, whose attacks upon helpless females by cutting them with a knife had a short time previously given him an extra- ordinary but unenviable notoriety under the epithet of "The Monster," he entitled it " The Monster broke loose; 57* AN AMATEUR OF THE FINE ARTS. or* a Peep into the Shakspeare Gallery." The accusation it is intended to convey, and the motives supposed to have led to it, will be understood by the soliloquy here put into Boydell's mouth : " There, there! there's a nice gash ! There ! ah ! this will be a glorious subject for to make a fuss about in the newspapers ; a hundred guineas reward will make a fine sound ; there ! there ! AN AMATEUB OF THE FIN* ABT8. ing about the Gallery; and it wilt bring in a rare sight of shillings for seeing of the cut pictures ; there ! and there again ! egad, there's nothing like having a good head-piece ! here ! here ! there ! there ! and then these small pictures won't cost a great deal of money replacing; indeed one would not like to cut a large one to pieces for the sake of making it look as if people envied us ; no ! that would cost rather too much, and my pocket begins but, mum ! that's nothing to nobody well, none can blame me for going the cheapest way to work, to keep up the reputation oi the Gallery ; there ! there ! there ! there ! there !" In his memorial to the House of Commons, at the beginning of the present century, praying for an act to enable him to dispose of his stock in trade of the fine arts by lottery, Boydell stated that he had expended more than four hundred thousand pounds in encouraging talent in this country. He had become reduced in circumstances, and the Gallery was dispersed by public sale. At a later period he was obliged to appeal to the law to oblige many of his subscribers to continue their subscrip- tions to his series of Shakspeare illustrations, which they refused to do on account of the length of time that had elapsed before the publication was completed. With a few exceptions, our historical school of painting at first shewed no great symptoms of talent ; it savoured too much of that general mediocrity which flourished under the equivocal kind of patronage which the third of the Georges had substi- tuted for the scornful contempt shewn to art as well as literature by his two predecessors. West, with his coarse Scriptural pieces, * The words in italics are crossed through in the engraving, as though to be erased. PETER PINDAR AND THE ARTISTS. 573 and the foreign Loutherbourg with his gaudy landscapes, basked in the sun of royal favour, while Sir Joshua Reynolds and Wilson were treated with neglect. West was elected president of the newly-instituted Royal Academy, and received every kind of mark of royal attention ; for the King was rather vain of passing for a connoisseur, and he liked to show it by his fami- liarity with the artist. Before Boydell came forward to offer encouragement to art, the academicians had been exposed to the bitter shafts of satire. The " Lyric Odes to the Royal Acade- micians," drawn forth by the exhibitions of the years 1782, 1783, 1785, and 1786, were the first productions that made known the name of Peter Pindar. The humorous but skilful critic of art, who made his debut under this pseudonym, shews no mercy to the academic president, the favourite of royalty, whom he accuses of painting the Saviour " like an old-clothes man" and the apostles like thieves, and of aspiring to cover " acres of canvas" rather than aiming at perfection in a few works. Still, " To give the devl his due, thou dost inherit Some pigmy portion of the painting spirit ; Bat what is this, compared to loftier things ! Thine is the fortune (making rivals groan) Of wink and nod familiar from the throne, And sweetest whispers from the best of kings. " Nods, and winks-royal, since the world began, Are immortalities for little man." Peter treats with as little ceremony the favoured portrait- painter Chamberlin, and the royal landscape-painter Louther- bourg, " Thy portraits, Chamberlin, may be A likeness, far as I can see ; But, faith ! I cannot praise a single feature : Yet, when it so shall please the Lord To make his people out of board, Thy pictures will be tolerable nature ! " And Loutherbourg, when heav'n so wills To make brass skies, and golden hills, With marble bullocks in glass pastures grazing ; Thy reputation, too, will rise, And people, gaping with surprise, Cry, ' Monsieur Loutherbourg is most amazing P " But thou must wait for that event Perhaps the change is never meant Till then, with me thy pencil will not abine Till then, old red-nosed Wilson's art Will hold its empire o'er my heart, By Britain left in poverty to pine. SIS JOSHUA REYNOLDS. " But, honest Wilson, never mind ; Immortal praises thou shalt find, And for a dinner have no cause to fear. Thou start' st at my prophetic rhymes I Don't be impatient for those times Wait till thou hast been dead a hundred year."* Peter's predictions have been fulfilled sooner than he antici- pated, for the works of Wilson are now bought up at high prices, while those of the men who were most cried up in his time are thrown aside with contempt. Among the latter was Wright of Derby, an affected painter of moonlight scenes, which the satirist describes as exhibiting " Woollen hills, where gold and silver moons Now mount like sixpences, and now balloons ; Where sea-reflections nothing nat'ral tell ye, So much like fiddle-strings, or vermicelli ; Where ev'rything exclaimeth (how severe !) ' What are we V and ' What business have we here ?'" Reynolds was one of those whose works had no charms for the eyes of royalty, and the satirical critic exclaims, with an air of satisfaction, " Thank God ! that monarchs cannot taste control, And make each subject's poor, submissive soul Admire the work that judgment oft cries fie on : Had things been so, poor Reynolds we had seen Painting a barber's pole an alehouse queen The cat-and-gridiron or the old red lion ! At Plympton, p'rhaps, for some grave Doctor Slop, Painting the pots and bottles of the shop ; Or in the drama, to get meat to munch, His brush divine had pictured scenes for Punch ! " Whilst West was whelping, "midst his paints, Moses and Aaron, and all sorts of saints ! Adams and Eves, and snakes and apples, And dev'ls, for beautifying certain chapels ; But Reynolds is no favourite, that's the matter ; He has not learnt the noble art to flatter. " Thrice happy times ! when monarchs find them hard things To teach us what to view with admiration ; And, like their heads on halfpence and brass farthings, Make their opinions current through the nation!" Public opinion eventually forced Sir Joshua Reynolds to royal * We are informed in a note to this passage, that Wilson, who was cer- tainly a great artist, was desired by his friend, Sir William Chambers, to paint a picture for the King, on which occasion he produced one of his best paintings. Yet, when this picture was shewn to his majesty, it was laughed at, and the King exhibited his knowledge of art in returning it with contempt. THE VENETIAN SECRET. 575 attention. Peter Pindar closes his attacks on the academicians with an expression of rather general censure, " Ye royal sirs, before I bid adieu, Let me inform you, some deserve my praise ; But trust me, gentle squires, they are but few Whose names would not disgrace my lays. You'll say, with grinning, sharp, sarcastic face, ' We must be bad indeed, if that's the case.' Why, if the truth I must declare, So, gentle squires, you really are." But a few years passed over from the time Peter Pindar thus pointed out the empty pretensions of so many of the earlier academicians, when a large portion of that eminent body became the dupe of a piece of very remarkable quackery. In the year 1797, a young female pretender to art, a Miss Pro vis, professed to have discovered the long-lost secret by which Titian and the other great artists of the Venetian school produced their gor- geous colouring, and, by dint of puffing and other tricks, she succeeded in gaining the faith of a large portion of the Royal Academy. Seven of the academicians are said more especially to have been her dupes, Farringdon, Opie, Westall, Hopner, Stothard, Smirk, and Rigaud. Until her discovery was exploded, this lady sold it in great secret for a very high price. She would now probably have been entirely forgotten, but for the pencil of Gillray, who, on the 2nd of November, 1797, made her secret the subject of a very large and remarkable caricature, entitled " Titianus redivivus ; or, the Seven Wise Men consulting the new Venetian Oracle." In the upper part of this bold picture, the lady artist is dashing off a daring subject with extraordinary effect of light and shade, her long ragged train ending in the immense tail of a peacock. The three naked Graces behind her, in the genuine coloured copies of this caricature, are painted of the gayest hues. She is leading the crowd of academicians by the nose over the gaudy rainbow to her study to behold her specimen of Venetian art. On one side, the buildings appro- priated to the Royal academy at Somerset House are falling into ruin, while on the other the temple of Fame is undergoing reparation. Below, we are introduced into the interior of the Academy, where the luckless seven occupy the foremost seats, deeply immersed in studying the merits of the new discovery. The ghost of Sir Joshua Reynolds rises up from the floor, con- templates the scene with astonishment, and apostrophises the groups in the words of Shakspeare, " Black spirits and white, blue spirits and grey, Mingle, mingle, mingle, you that mingle may !" 57<5 NEWSPAPERS AND MAGAZINES. On the opposite side are three persons making a hasty flight ; they are West, the president of the Academy, who was not a believer; Boydell, whose fears are excited for the fate of his Gallery, if this new invention should succeed and destroy the value of what had been done while it was unknown ; and Macklin, who experiences an equal alarm for his grand illustra- tions of the Bible, which were put up by lottery, the tickets five guineas each. These fears, as far as the " Venetian secret" was concerned, were not of long duration. No class of literature was undergoing a greater change during the middle part of the reign of George III. than the periodical press, which was especially affected by the revolutions in poli- tical and moral feelings which characterised the age preceding, as well as that which followed the bursting out of the French revolution. The newspapers, which had varied but little in appearance from the beginning of the century to the earlier part of George's reign, now appear with new titles, and present themselves in a much enlarged and altered form. From an estimate given in the European Magazine for October, 1794, we learn that, while in 1724 only three daily, six weekly, and ten evening papers three times a week, were published in England, in 1792 there were published in London thirteen daily, twenty evening, and nine weekly papers, besides seventy country papers, and fourteen in Scotland. Among the London papers we recog- nise the names of the principal daily papers of modern times. The Morning Chronicle was established in the year 1770, the Morning Post in 1772, and the Morning Herald in 1780, and they were followed by the Times in 1788. They began, in accordance with the depraved taste as well as manners of that age, with courting popularity by detailing largely the most inde- licate private scandal, and with coarse libels on public as well as private characters, things for which the Post enjoyed a special celebrity. The Chronicle was from the first the organ of the Whigs ; the Post was at first a violent organ of Toryism, it (subsequently became revolutionary in its principles, and then returned to its original politics ; the Herald also has not been uniform in politics from its commencement. Of seven new magazines which were started from 1769 to 1771, the Town and Country Magazine, the Covent Garden Magazine, the Matri- monial Magazine, the Macaroni Magazine, the Sentimental Magazine, the Westminster Magazine, and the Oxford Maga- zine, two at least were obscene publications, and the feeling of the time allowed the titles of the licentious plates which illus- trated them and of the articles they contained to be advertised STATE OF LITERATURE. 577 monthly in the most respectable newspapers in words which left no doubt of their character. The others gave insertion to a mass of scandal that ought to have been offensive to public morality. After a few years society seems to have resented the outrage, the newspapers became less libellous, and the offensive magazines disappeared. The literary character of the magazines, which may always be taken to a certain degree as an index of public taste, remained long very low. They consisted of extracts from common books and reprints of articles which had appeared before, of crude essays by unpaid correspondents, who were ambitious of seeing themselves in print, and of reviews of new publications, which constituted the most original part of the mixture. The reviews continued for a long time to be short and flippant, and in many cases the writer seems to have read or seen only the title of the book he reviews. Thus, in the Westminster Magazine for May, 1774, Jacob Bryant's well-known "New System of Ancient Mythology," in two large quarto volumes, is reviewed in four words, " Learned, critical, and ingenious ;" and another quarto volume, " Science Improved," by Thomas Harrington, is condemned with similar brevity " Crude, obscure, and bombastic." In the same maga- zine for September, 1774, that important work, Strutt's "Regal Antiquities," is dismissed with the observation, "Curious, useful, and pleasing." The triad of epithets, which recurs per- petually, is amusing. It is an authoritative style of giving judgment that seems to come from the Johnsonian school. Some of the most remarkable examples are found in the Town and Country Magazine, which, in March, 1771, expresses its critical judgment in the following elegant terms: " The Exhibition in Hell ; or, Moloch turned Painter. Svo. price it. A hellish bad painter, and a d d bad writer 1" A few years later, the critical notices in the magazines became somewhat more diffuse ; the reviews endeavoured to give their readers a little more information relating to the contents of new publications; and sometimes, as in the European Magazine, they added a chapter at the end, under the title of " Anecdotes of the Author," in which they stated all they knew of his pri- vate history. Towards the close of the century, professed reviews, in contradistinction to magazines, began to be more common. The reviewers of the last century were strongly tainted with the feelings which agitated and divided society, and they con- p P 578 REVOLUTION IN LITERATURE. stantly overlooked that necessary qualification of a critic, im- partiality ; they too often punished the political opinions of the writer by abusing his writings, however far they might be from allusions to political subjects, or however meritorious in charac- ter : but they deserve praise for the constancy with which they attacked that shoal of frivolous and often pernicious matter that was daily sent into the world in the shape of novels and secret memoirs, of the most nauseous and indelicate description. The influence of these was most extensive previous to the year 1 790. The violent intellectual agitation which followed the French revolution gave a more manly vigour to the literature of the following age. It seemed for a moment to have raised the burthen which had so long weighed heavily upon' the mental energies, and to promise them relief from that cold influence of interested patronage which had so often blighted genius in the bud. The most distinguished literary characters of the last age, the Wordsworths, Campbells, Southeys, Coleridges and Roscoes, began their career in ardent admiration of the democratic principles which were spreading from revolutionized Prance: they imagined they had fallen upon the opening of a new and brighter era, and they looked forwards in vain hopes to the prospect of an age in which genius would no longer be the slave of selfish or capricious patronage on the one hand, or of specula- tive avarice on the other. The illusion soon passed away, but not without leaving an imprint which has effected a total change in the literature of this country. The change which was taking place at the end of the century, placed the two literatures of the past and the future for a while in direct hostility to each other, and produced a number of satirical writings of a new description, the types of which are found in " The Pursuits of Literature," published anonymously, but now understood to be the work of Mathias, and the " Baviad and Mseviad" of Gifford. These now appear dull enough, but they applied the lash unsparingly to the crowd of fashionable writers who constituted the literary legacy of the preceding age. Per- haps, among the different shades of literary pretension which were struggling for fame at the period when the influence of the French revolution began to be felt, the least dignified was that party of individuals who attempted to raise a reputation on the fragments which had been scattered from the table of Johnson. Boswell, and Madame Thrale, who had by a rather discreditable marriage with a music teacher, taken the name of Piozzi, and several others, long disputed over the remains of the " great THE SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES. 579 moralist," as he was termed, and afforded no small amusement to the public. This was one of the few public literary ques- tions which, during the latter part of the century, became the subject of caricatures, and those possess nothing very striking in their character. Two of these, published in 1786 and 1788, were by Sayer. This dispute, which caused much sensation for several years, is better known by Peter Pindar's " Town Eclogue" of Bozzi and Piozzi. The ungenial patronage of the court of George III. was as little successful in fostering literature and science, as it had shewn itself to be with respect to art. It was during this reign that societies began to be formed more generally to for- ward literary and scientific objects, but they in some instances seemed to share in the jealousy that was shewn towards political associations. The Society of Antiquaries, which had received its charter of incorporation from G-eorge II., was received into some degree of favour by his grandson, who, in 1780, placed it in apartments near his favourite "Academy" in Somerset House. Its labours had hitherto been little productive, and often puerile; it took no prominent part, even in the historical literature of the day, and is seldom mentioned in the popular literature, except in terms of ridicule. In 1772, the society was brought on the stage by Foote, deliberating on the history of Whitting- ton and his cat. It appears that the honour shewn to it by royalty, did not protect it from becoming a dupe to practical jokes. In 1790, some wag produced a drawing of a stone pre- tended to have been discovered in Kennington Lane, on the site of an ancient palace of Hardicnut, bearing an inscription to that monarch's memory in Saxon characters and in Anglo- Saxon verse, which, literally translated, informed the world that " Here Hardyknute the king drank a wine-horn dry, and stared about him and died." It is said that this inscription and ex- planation were received and read at one of the meetings of the society of antiquaries as a bond fide communication, and the perpetrator of the joke immediately made it public for the amusement of the world, and to the discomfiture of the learned archaeologists. This trifling incident made its noise at the time, and was taken up in a satirical vein by other humorists, who followed it up with mock dissertations and mock translations. Some of the latter exhibited the same vein of personal* satire which had dictated the longer and more celebrated "probationary odes." Thus Sir Cecil Wray is made to contribute the following poetical version p p a 580 HARDICNUFS EPITAPH. " Here Hardyknute, with horn of wine, Drank, died, and stared much ; And at my lost elec ti on Too many there were such." Another parliamentary and ministerial rhymer, Sir Joseph Mawbey, was also introduced making a personal application of the theme, " Here Hardyknute his wash (O brute !) Did twill from Danish horn ; So bursting wide his harslet, died, And of his life was shorn. " As pig doth look, that's newly stuck, And stare, so stared he ; And so, at my next canvass, I May stare for company." Among other versions, the joking editor cites the first line of that by M. le Texier, who he says had, "with the levity peculiar to his countrymen," given a gay turn to the epitaph, which he made to open thus " Aha ! cher Monsieur Ardiknute !" And he adds, " The last has the same defect as the two preced- ing ones, for it is rather a sportive paraphrase than a fair trans- lation. As it comes, however, from a young poetical divine, resident in the archiepiscopal palace at Lambeth (the very place of Hardyknute's demise), it will possibly be received with in- dulgence, and especially by the gentleman who produced its original to the Antiquary Society. " If Hardyknute at Lambeth feast, Where each man made himself a beast, On such a draught did venture ; Though drink he did, and stare, and die, 'Tis clear to every mortal eye That he was no dissenter. " However respectable their character as societies, and however talented and well-intentioned some of their members, it must be acknowledged that neither archseology nor science were at this time receiving the benefits they might have done from the labours of the society of Antiquaries and its neighbour the Royal Society. The latter was rent to pieces by jealousies and dispute's. It had received a gleam from the sun of royal favour in the person of its president, Sir Joseph Banks, who had pur- sued science in company with Captain Cook in the distant isles of the Pacific, and whose adventures in the study of natural history at home and the undue eminence which he was believed SIS JOSEPH BANKS e$i to hold by the mere title of royal favouritism, made him the object of many a caricature and satire. In one of the latter in the collection of Mr. Burke, the learned president of the Eoyal Society is represented under the character and title of " The great South-sea Catterpillar trans- formed into a Bath butterfly." His wings are adorned with figures of starfish, crabs, and other fa- vourite objects of his attention. This print is dated on the 4th of July, 1795, soon after Sir Joseph had been chosen a knight of the Bath. Another caricature, also in the possession of Mr. Burke, represents the scene described in Peter Pindar's well-known tale of " Sir Joseph Banks and the Em- peror of Morocco." The " presi- dent in butterflies profound," as he has termed him, was a sub- ject of frequent satire from Peter's pen. THE BUTTERFLY OF BOUNCE. CHAPTER XV. GEOEGE HI. The Imperial Parliament Change of Ministry Peace with France- New Step in Buonaparte's Ambition Renewal of Hostilities, and Threatened Invasion Defensive Agitation ; Volunteers ; Caricatures and Songs Return of Pitt to Power Buonaparte Emperor Trafalgar Death of Pitt The Broad-Bottom Ministry Death of Fox General Election The War. THE nineteenth century opened in this country with political prospects by no means of the most cheering description. "With a burthen of taxation infinitely beyond anything that had ever been known before, England found herself in danger of being left single-handed in an interminable contest with a power which was now rapidly humbling at its feet the whole of the continent of Europe, and which had already adopted, with regard to us, the old motto of delenda est Carthago. We had no longer to contend with a democratic republic, as heretofore, but with a skilful and unscrupulous leader, who was already a sovereign in fact, and who was marching quickly towards a throne. The union with Ireland had been completed, and was put into effect ; but the sister isle remained dissatisfied and turbulent, and but a few months passed over before a new rebellion broke out, of a serious character. The union itself had not passed without considerable opp osition in this country, and the advan- tages which its advocates promised as the result, were ridiculed or disbelieved. Among the caricatures on this subject which appeared during the year 1800, one represented Pitt from the state pulpit publishing the banns of union between John Bull and Miss Hibernia. In another, under the title of " A Flight across the Herring-pool," the Irish gentry are seen quitting their country in crowds to share in the good things which Pitt is laying before them in England, thus setting the example of that evil of absenteeism which has been so much complained of in more recent times. The first imperial parliament met on the 22nd of January, 1801, and was attended with two remarkable circumstances, the election of the Eev. John Home Tooke for the borough of Old Sarum, and the reappearance of Fox at his post in the House THE ADDINGTON MINISTRY. 583 of Commons. Fox reappeared in the house for the first time on the and of March, and one of the earliest signs of his returning activity was his support of the right of Home Tooke to a seat there. A caricature, published on the I4th of March, entitled " The Westminster Seceder on Fresh Duty," represents Fox bending his broad back to enable the reverend candidate to get into St. Stephen's chapel through the window, while Lord Temple is shutting the door against him. Tooke had been returned for Old Sarum by Lord Camelford. His admission was opposed on the ground of his clerical profession, and it led to a bill making clergymen incapable of sitting in parliament. Tooke held his seat for a very brief period, during which he did no act of importance. A caricature, by Gillray, published on the ijjth of March, under the title of "Political Amusements for Young Gentlemen ; or, the old Brentford Shuttlecock," represents the head of Tooke formed into a plaything, the feathers of which intimate sufficiently his character, tossed backwards and forwards between Lord Camelford, to whom he owed his election, and Lord Temple, who led the opposition to his admission. Before this question came under discussion, Pitt had quitted the ministry. Having in his anxiety to procure the support of the Catholic body in Ireland for his grand project of union, made an implied promise to support the cause of Catholic emancipation, and finding the King ob- stinately opposed to it, he seized upon this as the occasion for retiring from office. The opposition ascribed to him different motives: they said that, alarmed at the difficulties into which he had plunged the country, he wished to withdraw from personal responsibility, and they prophesied that he would con- ^ SHUTTLECOCK. tinue to be, in fact, as much minister as before. This seems to receive some confirmation from the fact that Henry Addington, the son of Doctor Addington, one of the physicians who had attended . Would make but a pitiful stone. 636 TAXATION AND REFORM. People's minds were now left at liberty to contemplate tlie condition of the country at home, and they began to be more and more alarmed at the fearful weight of taxation with which it was burthened. Increasing dissatisfaction and distress pro- duced louder cries, and the financial sins of ministers were visited with caricatures and satires, as well as with the severer com- ments of radical journals and pamphlets. The tax on soap in 1816, is celebrated in a caricature, published on the 2ist of June, representing a scene in a wash-house, where the merry figure of A MIN1STEB IN THE SUDS. the minister, Vansittart, issues from a tub of suds, to the great astonishment of the washerwoman : " Here am I, Betty ; how are you off for soap ?" " Lord, Mr. Vansittart ! who could have thought of seeing you in the washing-tub." The English government persisted in the old traditional no- movement policy of William Pitt, when all the excitement which supported him in that policy had long died away ; and they went on increasing the general discontent by a still more rigorous system of resistance to popular complaints and by an increase of political prosecutions. The period of the regency was one of national distress and national troubles. It abounded in caricatures, and in political satires and libels ; indeed, it is enough to say that it was the age of William Hone. It was the age of Burdett and Cobbett, of Hunt and radical reformers and riots. Hunt, the hero of Manchester and Smithfield, was now taking the place in mob popularity which had before been held by Burdett. A caricature, published in July, 1819, entitled, " The Smithfield Parliament ; i. e. universal suffrage the new speaker addressing the members," represents Hunt with the head of an ass, mounted on a cart, and addressing an immense COSTUME. 6 37 A BADICAL. assemblage of cattle, sheep, pigs, donkeys, and other equally sapient animals, "I shall be ambi- tious, indeed, if I thought my bray would be heard by the immense and respectable multitude I have the honour to address." The animals applaud with a mingled murmur of voices, " hear ! hear ! bravo !" The peace commences a new era in English history. Within the few years immediately preceding and fol- lowing it, English society went through a remarkably rapid change ; a change, as far as we can see, of a decidedly favourable kind. In social condition and character, public senti ment and public morals, literature, and science, were all improved. As the vio- lent internal agitation of the country during the regency increased the num- ber of political caricatures and satirical writings, so the succes- sion of fashions, varying in extra- vagance, which characterized the same period, produced a greater number of caricatures on dress and on fashionable manners, than had been seen at any previous period. During the first twelve or fifteen years of the present century, the general character of the cos- tume appears not to have under- gone any great change. The two figures here given, which represent the mode in 1810, may be com- pared with those of 1803, given on a former page. The principal dif- ference consists in the change of the wide cravat, for a very large shirt collar, in the gentleman ; and, in the lady, the excess of covering to her person. Between cap, bonnet, collar, and frill, even their laces are nearly concealed ; and it is probably for this reason that they are termed in the original nriu'. " invisibles." 6. 3 8 THE DANDIES. A few years later the fashionable costume furnished an extraordinary contrast with that just represented. The waist was again shortened, as well as the frock and petticoat, and, instead of concealment, it seemed to be the aim of the ladies to exhibit to view as much of the body as possible. The fops of 1819 and 1820 received the name of dandies, the ladies that of dandizettes. The accompanying cut is from a rather broadly caricatured print of a dandizette of the year 1819. It must be considered only as a type of the general character of the foppish costume of the period ; for in no time was there ever such a variety of forms in the dresses of both sexes as at the period alluded to. I give, with the same reservation, a figure of a dandy, from a caricature of the same year. The number of caricatures on the dandies and dandizettes, and on their fopperies and follies, during the years 1819, 1820, and 1821, was perfectly astonishing. A new mania also came to take the place of the old rage for balloons it was the mania for hobby-horses. For two or three years it might literally be said that every man had his hobby. Hobby- horses figured in the parks, and were to be seen in every road, not only round London, but near most large towns in the country, whither this fashion was carried. Dandies, or not dandies, all were infected with this strange mania, which fur- nished matter for caricature upon caricature in great abundance. In these, the hobby mania was often applied politically, and all colours, and parties, and ranks, whether prince or minister, Tory or Radical were made to ride their hobbies in one way or other. The cut with which we close the volume is taken from a caricature published on the 8th of April, 1819, and represents the military episcopal Duke of York he was com- mander-in-chiefand prince-bishop of Osnaburg riding his hobby for economy, on the road to Windsor. It was a period at which the outcry against the extravagance of the civil list in which the duke partook largely was particularly loud and violent. John Bull, who is somewhat astonished at the figure cut by the royal hobby-rider, and his boasts of economy, exclaimt, " Dang it, mister bishop, thee art saving, indeed ; thee used so A DANDIZETTE. SOBBY-nOESES. 639 ride in a coach and six, now I pay thee 10,000 a-year more, A DANDY. thee art riding a wooden horse for all the world like a gate-post !' A KOTAL DUKK AND HIS HOBBT. Trivialities like these close one of the moet extraordinary periods of our history. rirr END. SATILL, EDWARD? AND CO., PRINTERS, CHANDOS 8TKEBT, COVKNT GAKDKN College Library DA 480 -; 001 005 850 1