Crying for the Light: or, Fifty Years Ago. Volume 2 of 3
‘For what purpose: public or private?’
‘Why, Mr. Wentworth, how can you ask? I am a Liberal.’
‘And, then, are all Liberals public spirited, and not averse to feathering their own nest when they have a chance?’
‘Well, you know,’ replied the Baronet, ‘our party always aim at the public good.’
‘Yes; but professions and practice don’t always harmonize. Sometimes private interest draws one way, and public duty points another.’
Sir Watkin coloured. He had consented to fight Sloville in the Liberal interest, but he had made a bargain on the subject with his party, and Wentworth’s casual remark had gone home.
Wentworth continued:
‘In what way can I help you, Sir Watkin?’
‘Mr. Blank tells me that you know something of Sloville.’
‘Very little, indeed. I was there a short while some years ago. That is all. I doubt whether I can do you any good there.’
‘Oh yes, you can. I recollect hearing you speak on the night of the Chartist meeting, and upon my word you spoke out well. There are many who still remember that speech.’
‘Yes; but it did not gain me many friends.’
‘Well, it was talked about for a good while after.’
‘Do you want me to repeat it?’
‘Not exactly, but I am not much of a speaker myself, and I want a clever man like yourself to be by my side, and speak now and then on my behalf. Of course I should be prepared to pay handsomely for such assistance.’
‘I am much obliged for the offer. Of course I feel complimented by it,’ said Wentworth; ‘but I fear that sort of thing is not much in my line. Indeed, I hear so much oratory that I am sick of it, and have come to regard an orator as a personal enemy, who really desires to do me wrong. In the heat of the moment an orator is apt to forget himself, to fling charges against his opponents which he cannot justify, and make promises to the people which he cannot perform. I fear a good deal of humbug goes on when there is much oratory, and that a man who gets into a habit of public speaking later on becomes a humbug himself. At any rate, I know this is true of some of our London popular orators. You may be better in the country. It is to be hoped you are.’
‘As to oratory, we are very badly off. And that is the real reason,’ said Sir Watkin, ‘why I came to you. I am not, as I have said, much of a speaker myself. Whereas my Conservative opponent is a clever barrister, with a tremendous gift of gab.’
‘Yes, that is it. You ought to go to a barrister and take him down with you. So long as a barrister is well paid he is ready to speak on any side.’
‘But there are difficulties which I fear will prevent my doing that. I want a novelty – a newspaper man, in fact. Lawyers have such a professional style of talking. They deceive no one; no one believes them. If a lawyer ever does by accident make a good speech it carries no weight with it. It is expected as a matter of course. If a lawyer can’t talk we don’t think much of him or his law, and then there is another reason.’
‘What is that?’ said Wentworth, lazily puffing his cigar.
‘Lawyers ain’t popular at Sloville with the Radicals. They say that our present law is a disgrace to the country, and that as long as we fill the House with lawyers, we shall never get a proper measure of law reform. In our town the people are very much opposed to lawyers and parsons.’
‘Very wrong of them,’ said Wentworth ironically.
‘Very wrong, indeed,’ replied the Baronet; ‘but we must take people as we find them, and act accordingly. It is no use sending down a lawyer to fight for me. The people would not go to hear him. Their last representative won by the aid of a lawyer, and they won’t stand another.’
‘But, then, in London there are no end of men who pass themselves off as working-men politicians, though it is precious little work they do. I believe they are to be had at a very moderate figure, and they can do the roaring part of the business first-rate. They are always trotted out when the Liberals want to get up a grand demonstration, more especially when the Conservatives are in place and power. Had not you better take one or two of them down with you? They’ll be sure to fetch the rest.’
‘Alas, I’ve tried them,’ said the Baronet, ‘and I found they were of no use. As soon as they had fingered a fiver or two they began to give themselves such airs. I could not get on with them at all, and after all,’ said the speaker, looking down complacently at his well-dressed figure, ‘people prefer a gentleman.’
‘Perhaps so; but real gentlemen are scarce nowadays,’ said Wentworth. ‘Where is the real gentleman now, brave, truthful, unsullied, with hands and heart clean, without fear or reproach? In political life, at any rate, he seems to me almost as extinct as the dodo.’
Wentworth was getting on dangerous ground. He had a faint suspicion that his visitor was not one of this class. The visitor felt it himself, and was getting rather uncomfortable in consequence. He had come on business to hire a speaker, and to pay him for his services, and to be helped in other ways. Fellows who wrote in newspapers had, he knew, many ways of obliging a friend. It was important to him to get into Parliament. If he carried Sloville he conferred a favour on Ministers, who would reward him in due time with a comfortable office, where the pay was heavy and the burden light, and just at that time money was an object to our Baronet, who as a gambler and man of the world managed to get rid of a good deal of it in the course of a year. At any rate he rather liked the look of M.P. after his name, and M.P. he was determined to be. All his life he had lived in excitement, and now he had reached an age when the excitement of politics in lieu of wine or women or horse-racing or gambling had special charms.
‘You see,’ he remarked, ‘we are an old family in the neighbourhood, and we have a certain amount of legitimate influence which will certainly be in my favour.’
He might have added that in the day of rotten boroughs it was as proprietor of Sloville, and as in that capacity a useful servant of the Government, that the first baronet of the family had been adorned with his hereditary rank. A Royal Duke had been guilty of gross misconduct – a slight indiscretion it was termed by his friends. The matter was brought before Parliament, and a vote by no means complimentary to H.R.H. – either as regards morals, or manners, or understanding – would have been carried, had not the Strahan of that day saved the Government by his casting vote. Government was grateful, and so was Strahan – in the sense of further favours to come.
‘Well, that is something,’ said Wentworth; ‘birth and connection are of some account in politics.’
‘I should think so,’ said the Baronet.
‘And the borough is Liberal?’
‘Most decidedly.’
‘And you have a good chance of success?’
‘Yes; if it were not for the publicans, who have great influence, and are bitterly opposed to the Liberals.’
‘Naturally; their craft is in danger. Well, I might run down to one or two of your meetings.’
‘Thanks; I’m much obliged. I thought about having a public meeting next week. There is no time to lose. It is a great thing to be first in the field.’
Just as Wentworth was about to reply, the door opened, and the actress rushed in. Suddenly perceiving that Wentworth had company, she exclaimed:
‘I beg pardon. I thought you were alone.’
‘Never mind, madam,’ said the Baronet; ‘we have just finished what we had to say,’ turning to address the last comer. All at once he faltered, and turned all the colours of the rainbow. Could it be? Yes, it was the poor girl he had brought up to London, and then deserted – left, as he coolly supposed, to perish on the streets, and whom, to his surprise, he had seen radiant on the stage.
A stony and contemptuous stare was the actress’s only reply.
‘Dear me,’ said the Baronet, recovering his self-possession. ‘’Pon my honour, this is an unexpected pleasure;’ but before he had finished his sentence Rose had gone.
‘You’ll excuse me, I am sure,’ said the Baronet, turning round to Wentworth; ‘I believe that young lady and I are old friends. I had lost sight of her for a long while, and to my intense astonishment and gratification I found her acting at Drury Lane. I followed her the other night in a cab in order to overtake her and explain everything; but her coachman was quicker than mine, and I was obliged to give up the chase.’
‘I am sorry you should have had so much trouble, Sir Watkin. That young lady needs no attention from you, nor will she require any explanation.’
‘Well, I am sure I congratulate you, Mr. Wentworth, to have such an acquaintance,’ returned the Baronet ungraciously. ‘Her beauty as a girl quite overcame me, and I was very much tempted to act in a foolish manner to her. We men of the world are apt to do silly things.’
‘Instead,’ said Wentworth, with increasing anger, ‘you preferred to make a fool of her. I found her when you had thrown her off, and abandoned her to the cruel mercies of the world. I saw her in her bitter agony and despair. I saved her from dishonour. For all you cared she might have been on the streets in infamy and rags. She has little to thank you for. I know how she had been deceived. Weeping, she told me the story of her life; but I never knew who was the wrong-doer until this moment. I have an account to settle with him,’ he added angrily.
‘And you find him penitent,’ said the Baronet.
‘Penitent or not, I vowed I would call him to account.’
‘My good sir,’ said the Baronet, ‘how was I to know that the lady was in any danger? I was not even in England at the time. I felt she would soon forget me, as indeed she seems to have done,’ added the speaker sarcastically. ‘Now I come to think of it,’ he continued, ‘I think it is I, indeed, who have reason to complain. You see with what scorn she treated me as she came into the room.’
‘Surely, Sir Watkin cannot wonder at that.’
‘On the contrary, I think it rather hard, after the money I spent on her.’
‘That won’t do, Sir Watkin! You, and such as you, are a disgrace to your class; cruel as wild beasts you spend your lives in pursuit of victims whom you ruin with fair words and foul lies and for foul ends. A time must come when England will no longer tolerate such men in her midst. English women will come to the rescue of their tempted sisters. Society will demand that wealth should not thus be iniquitously squandered in pursuit of vice and selfish gratifications. There is no greater crime a rich man can commit, and yet there is no punishment can reach him. The rich man can always get off, or take himself off. He leaves the seduced to perish of want and infamy, while he is honoured and admired.’
‘Upon my word, Mr. Wentworth, you are using language which I am quite unaccustomed to.’
‘I dare say you are, Sir Watkin; but it is the language of truth and soberness, nevertheless.’
‘Why, one would fancy you were a parson, and availing yourself of the privileges of the cloth,’ said the Baronet with sneer.
‘I was very near being one,’ said Wentworth; ‘and now I recollect that it was then you and I met for the first time. I remember you nearly ran over a poor old woman who was coming to hear me preach.’
‘Upon my word you have a good memory. I’d forgotten all about it.’
‘So good a memory,’ said Wentworth, ‘that for the future I recommend you to keep out of my way.’
‘By all means,’ replied the Baronet; ‘but you ought to hear what I have to say in my defence. I own my conduct was shabby.’
‘It was infamous.’
‘But recollect what a mess I was in.’
‘I will not hear another word,’ said Wentworth. ‘Leave this room, or – ’
But there was no occasion to say what he meant to say. Putting on his hat and gathering up his gloves, the Baronet retreated as quickly as he could, looking very different to the finished and self-satisfied appearance of respectability he presented when he first knocked at the door.
‘The scoundrel!’ said Wentworth to himself when alone. ‘He will hear from me further. I have not done with him yet. I’ll meet him at Philippi. I’ll take care that he does not get in for Sloville after all.’
And he kept his word.
CHAPTER XV.
ELECTIONEERING
The writ for Sloville would be out in a few days. The defeated Liberals were winding up business in Parliament as quickly as possible, in order at once to appeal to the country. The Tadpoles and Tapers were at their wits’ ends for a good cry. Wentworth rushed down to Sloville, invited the electors to hear him, advertised in the local papers, and covered the walls with his posters. He was for the extension of the Franchise to all men of age of sound mind, untainted by crime, and to all women who paid rates and taxes. He advocated the separation of Church and State, arbitration instead of war, reduction of national expenditure, a reform of the House of Lords, free trade in land, and free secular education. He was ready even to give Ireland as much Home Rule as he would give to England or Scotland. At that time the great Liberal leader had not dreamed of anything of the kind.
‘I like that,’ said the Tory candidate to his agent; ‘all the respectable people will vote for me.’
‘Confound the fellow!’ said Sir Watkin, in a rage. ‘I shall have hard work to beat that, and if I did the people would never believe I meant it. I am of an old Whig family, and it is hard to give up one’s principles.’
‘We shall have to finesse a bit,’ said Sir Watkin’s agent and confidential man. ‘Suppose you placard yourself as the working-man’s friend.’
‘Capital!’ said Sir Watkin delightedly.
‘Suppose we send agents to break up all his meetings, so that he can’t be heard.’
‘A capital idea!’
‘Suppose we get the Rev. George Windbag, the leading Dissenting minister in the town, to make a grand speech at our first meeting, to talk of the need of unity and the danger of splitting up the Liberal Party. We can secure the man at once, Sir Watkin, if you will but ask him to dinner at the Hall. There is not a bigger tuft-hunter in the county, and he has immense weight with the respectable shop-keeping class.’
‘Capital!’ repeated the Baronet.
‘And suppose we get one or two Chartists from town. They will be sure to come. Pay them well, and feed them well, and you can do anything with them.’
‘Right you are,’ said the Baronet.
‘And we might get a Socialist or Republican down.’
‘What for?’
‘To divide the Rads.’
‘But I hate them like poison,’ said the Baronet.
‘Never mind,’ said the agent. ‘You need not appear in the matter. Leave them to me. I know how to secure them. This ain’t the first time I’ve been electioneering.’
‘So it seems,’ said the Baronet. ‘All I say is, keep me out of a scrape.’
‘That is not quite so easy as it was. Yet the thing can be done; Parliament, naturally being in favour of returning rich men to Parliament, is never much in earnest in attempting to put down bribery and corruption.’
‘Ah! my father had never much difficulty in securing his seat,’ said the Baronet in a tone of regret.
‘Yes; but he spent a good deal of money, as I have heard.’
‘That was true; but he got it all back again.’
‘Yes, he had an easy life of it. I was looking over Oldmixon, and he thus describes the borough as it was in the good old times. You recollect the town sent two members till the Reform Bill of 1831 robbed us of one?’
‘I have heard my father say so; but read what Oldmixon says.’
‘“Sloville. – This is a large town, containing more than a thousand houses, where the right of election is confined to a corporation of twenty-four individuals, who elect each other. The inhabitants have no share in choosing the members or magistrates, and as all these corporations – possessing exclusive rights of electing Members of Parliament – have some powerful nobleman or opulent commoner who finds it his interest to take the lead and management of their political influence, the election of the members is directed by this patron. The Earl of Fee-Fum, who has a seat at Marbourne, within seven miles of the town, and Watkin Strahan, Esq., of Elm Hall, whose residence and estate are also in the neighbourhood, have first command of this corporation.” At that time the number of votes, according to Oldmixon, was twenty-four.’
‘And now there are a thousand electors on the register. It is a pity we ever had Parliamentary reform.’
‘Sir Watkin, you are a Whig, are you not?’ said the agent.
‘Oh yes, of course I am. That was only my fun.’
‘It would not be fun if the people heard it.’
‘No, perhaps not. But we are talking privately and confidentially.’
‘Of course we are.’
‘But to business. How do matters stand?’
‘It is impossible to be better, or, rather, it would have been impossible. I’ve been nursing the borough a long while, but now the appearance of another Liberal candidate will give the Conservative a chance such as he otherwise would not have had.’
‘Yes, that is pretty clear. But how can we get rid of this Wentworth?’
‘Leave that to me. We can make it pretty hot for him. Just at this time the town is unusually full of roughs, and I know where to lay my hand on them. Brown, the Conservative agent, told me yesterday that he could always get a bigger lot of roughs than the Liberals. “I ain’t quite sure of that,” said I to myself, “as I think this Mr. Wentworth will find out before we are done with him.” Of course, he has got no money?’
‘Well, I don’t suppose he has,’ said Sir Watkin; ‘he is only a newspaper writer. Just like the impudence of his class. They talk about the fourth estate, and think themselves equals to Kings, Lords and Commons. However, we are right as far as the press is concerned. We have only one paper here, and that is ours. The proprietor is hard up. He owes me a lot of money, and he knows on which side his bread is buttered.’
The next day Wentworth came down to hold the first public meeting, and that same day every voter had a bill – and a good many who were not besides – as follows:
to theRadical and Liberal Electorsof theBOROUGH OF SLOVILLEattend theMEETING AT THE TOWN HALL,On Thursday Evening,At 7.45 sharp,To prevent the Election of the Tory CandidateThe placard was not in vain. The good seed had been sown on fruitful soil. The chairman, an old gentleman with whom Wentworth was familiar when he was a student, was quite unequal to the occasion, and he gave in at the first sign of a squall.
Let me recommend all Parliamentary candidates, when there is a contested election, to be very particular as to their chairman. An immense deal depends upon him. He ought to have a personal knowledge of all the individuals in the meeting, and an imperturbable good nature. He ought to have an enthusiastic prepossession in favour of his candidate. He ought to have a voice that could be heard above the roaring of any storm. He should have an intuitive faculty at feeling the pulse of the meeting. He should be a master of making an adversary look ridiculous. He should have the physical power to sit out any time in the midst of any row, no matter how noisy the crowd, and how heated the atmosphere. His tact should be great. He should have immense personal influence in the place. Above all, he should never lose his temper or have recourse to threats, unless he has an overwhelming majority on his side.
When Wentworth appeared upon the scene he saw at a glance that his enemies were far more numerous than his friends. His chairman, for instance, had taken no trouble about the meeting. He had not even brought a friend with him, and he and Wentworth had the platform almost entirely to themselves. This was an initial mistake. Learn of me, O candidate, and never attend a public meeting unless you can fill the platform with out-and-out adherents; men who will applaud in season and out; men whose solid front will impose on the ignorant and thoughtless; men whose countenances will express the utmost rapture at your stalest jokes or feeblest witticisms, who will seem absorbed and riveted by your dreariest display of statistics, and who will cheer the louder the more you stumble and get confused. Canning understood how useful aid of that sort was to a speaker when he wrote:
‘Cheer him when his audience flag,Brother Riley, Brother Bragg;Cheer him when he hobbles vilely,Brother Bragg and Brother Riley.’Again, another secret in the way of successful public meetings is to have beside the chairman, and in front of the audience, a jolly looking fellow always ready to laugh. We English are an imitative people. One laugher on the platform will make many laugh below. Laughter is contagious. One man laughs because he sees another doing so, and in nine cases out of ten at a public meeting if you ask him he can give no better reason. Ladies are all very well in front, if the meeting is harmonious, and they are well dressed and good-looking; but if they are well bred they do not roar out, and if they clap their hands it is in such a graceful feminine manner as to produce no effect like your red-faced jolly fellow, always ready with the loud laugh that speaks the vacant mind.
A few Radicals, delighted at Mr. Wentworth’s programme, were in the hall at the far end. Unfortunately between them and the platform were the enemy, who had rallied round in consequence of the lying hand-bill, and they were led by a full-necked gamekeeper, who roared like a bull of Bashan all the time Mr. Wentworth was speaking, or rather, attempting to speak. Sir Watkin Strahan’s agent was also present, to watch with complacency the result of his trick. The roughs had an idea that the more noise they made the better, and their number was increased by some of the Free and Independent, who had met the Gent from London, as they termed him, at the railway station, and who had been immensely disgusted, that in reply to their hints as to his ordering a supply of beer, he had intimated that so far as he could judge they had had enough already. That was adding insult to injury, and they resented it accordingly.
At all times the Free and Independent are a thirsty race, particularly at election times. In every beer-shop in the borough Wentworth had thus raised up a host of enemies. In many a borough the election has been fought and won by beer alone; there is no other product of man’s industry, unfortunately, such a power, and the publican is not such a fool as he looks.
‘Who do you vote for?’ said I to one of them at the time of an election contest.
‘For them as I gets the most by,’ was his reply.
Frightened at the aspect of affairs, the aged chairman, with a feeble, trembling voice, told his fellow-townsmen that he had the pleasure of introducing to them Mr. Wentworth, a clever journalist from London, whom some of them knew when he was formerly a preacher in that town, and whom he hoped they would listen to that evening with all the respect and attention the occasion demanded. It was with difficulty and not a little interruption that the chairman could say as much, and then he collapsed, wishing that he had stayed at home in the bosom of his family. The London candidate then came forward, to be assailed with a howl of derision from his foes closely packed in the front, while but a faint cheer from the far end was now and then perceptible as the roar was slightly lulled.
‘Gentlemen, pray give Mr. Wentworth a fair hearing,’ cried the chairman, and again the storm grew and the confusion increased. ‘Order! order!’ said the chairman, screaming at the top of his voice. He might just as well have spoken to the winds or waves. Then he grew angry and began to threaten, and that only made matters worse. Wentworth, erect as a statue and with folded arms, calmly surveyed the scene. It was not a pleasant sight; it suggests to one the truth of the Darwinian origin of the human race. In a crowd men act like monkeys. I remember as a boy sneaking into an election crowd and calling a decent, respectable, white-haired old baronet, who had been the Tory representative of the county for a quarter of a century, and whom every decent body respected, the old Benacre Bull (Benacre being the name of the village in which he lived); and everyone repeated the nickname till the old gentleman had to stop speaking, and I have been ashamed of the thing ever since. Had the individual members of that howling mob met the Baronet in the street as he rode by on his favourite chestnut mare, there was not one of them but would have treated him with every appearance of courtesy and respect. There is something very cowardly in an election mob.
