(_BY MR. PUNCH'S SPECIAL COMMISSIONER._)
The excitement is getting terrific. In the principal streets party
flags are waving gaily. In the suburbs every other house is hidden
beneath vast posters, setting forth the merits of the rival parties.
The Association of Jam-Dealers held a private meeting last night.
I was, however, enabled to be present having disguised myself as
Mr. BLACKFORD, one of the Vice-Presidents of the Association, who
was taken ill at the last moment, and whose letter of excuse for
non-attendance I managed to intercept. The proceedings opened with
prayer, on the model of the recent Ulster Convention. After this,
the discussion began. A series of questions had, it appears, been
addressed to both Candidates. Here they are:--
(1) Will you oppose any attempt to increase the import of foreign
jam-stuffs?
(2) Will you support a measure making it compulsory for the London
Cooperative Stores to sell only Jam manufactured by the Bunkham
Jam-Dealers' Association?
(3) Will you oppose any measure calculated to deprive the rising
generation of one of the necessaries of life in the shape of Bunkham
Jam? And will you therefore oppose, by all lawful Parliamentary means,
the use of the domestic rod as a punishment for so-called Jam-stealing
out of store-room cupboards?
(4) Which do you prefer, gooseberries, raspberries, or strawberries?
(5) Will you advocate a tax of twopence per pot on all jam not
manufactured in the Bunkham district?
Both Candidates had sent written replies. But it was generally felt
that on the answers to the fourth question, the vote of the meeting
would depend. Bunkham is a district in which raspberries and
gooseberries are almost exclusively grown. Now it is well-known that
Mr. PLEDGER, the Liberal Candidate, has an almost passionate affection
for strawberry-jam, and much interest was shown as to whether he would
be true to his favourite food, or renounce it in order to capture
votes. I am glad to say that the honourable gentleman refused to
palter with his convictions. In a manly and straightforward answer, he
declined to be a party to "a system of espionage which had invaded the
breakfast table, and might go far to make even luncheon intolerable."
"From my youth up," he continued, "I have never wavered in the
conviction, that of all known preserves, strawberry-jam is both the
best, and the most sustaining. I should disgrace myself if I were now,
at the eleventh hour, to declare a preference which I do not honestly
feel for gooseberry or raspberry."
This, of course, settled the matter. Mr. TUFFAN declared emphatically
against the obnoxious strawberry; and the result was that the
Association, by an enormous majority, decided to support him. The
Liberals were at first much discouraged, but they have now taken heart
again. One of their Canvassers, it seems, has succeeded in making
himself a _persona grata_ to a lady who occupies the position of
under-housemaid in the establishment of the TUFFANS. Through her he
obtained an empty pot of strawberry-jam, lately consumed by the
TUFFAN family. This has been fixed upon a long pole, with a placard
underneath it, to the following effect:--