BLIND SUPERSTITIONS
Speech before the British Association—Mill again—Bright and Lord
Brougham—The Mythical Committee Room—Defeat at Southwark.
[Sidenote: Blind Superstitions.]
Fawcett never deviated from his school-boy longing for a political
career. But despite the recognition which he had obtained as a speaker
and thinker, even his best friends felt that his dream of a political
future was worse than impracticable. They tried to dissuade him from his
purpose, and make him content with a writer’s life of study, thought and
theory.
Opposition, the breath of life to this dauntless man, only added another
stimulating obstacle to those he rejoiced to overcome—blindness, lack of
money, and lack of distinguished origin. He had made up his mind to be a
statesman before his accident; and he would in no wise falter. In the
wonderful crucible of his genial kindliness, the opposition of his
friends was distilled into a warm co-operation. He forced them to
believe in his powers and future, and changed them into his enthusiastic
political backers. His blindness, which appealed to the gentleness and
pity of many, with him became a recognised force to help him to great
feats of memory and prodigies of concentration. His very inability to
read books and newspapers compelled him to cultivate his memory and
tirelessly to think over the problems he wished to master. As a result
of constant practice, he became able to memorise statistical information
and use it in debate in a way which utterly baffled men of average
ability. Even the most brilliant men of his day would have to use notes
where Fawcett could trust to his memory alone.
[Sidenote: A Telling Speech.]
As we have said, a year after his blindness, with Brown to guide him, he
went to Aberdeen, and spoke before the British Association. His paper
there on the ‘Social and Economical Influence of the New Gold’ made a
profound impression, and won him his first public recognition as an
economist and statesman. He was much pleased with the result of his
first effort in public, and the cordiality with which he was personally
received.
But his sociability was not, as we know, confined to learned persons.
During a journey he found himself in a small Scottish inn with a lonely
dinner in prospect; he was cheered to hear voices in the next room. He
sent for the landlord and asked who was there. ‘Some commercial gents,’
was the reply. Fawcett asked the landlord to take his compliments to the
‘commercial gents,’ upon which he received an invitation to dine with
them. He accepted with alacrity, and passed a most jovial evening in
their company.
He next spoke at the Social Science Association at Bradford on the
Protection of Labour from Immigration, and also on the theory and
tendency of strikes. He made several loyal friends there, and his
manifest ability led some of them to wish he might become a
parliamentary candidate for a northern Borough.
The next year he acted as the member of a committee appointed by the
Social Science Association, to investigate the problem of strikes. Lord
Brougham and others of distinction were very friendly to him, though the
veteran Reformer made some remarks about the American War which, Fawcett
said, ‘drove me half wild.’
[Sidenote: Mill and a Political Opening.]
In 1860 Fawcett was greatly encouraged by a meeting with Mill, who
congratulated him on his choice of a political career. Mill considered
that the blind man’s loss of sight could only injure his prospects of
political success if with sight zeal had also gone. The affliction could
be turned into an asset which would arouse sympathy, and soften
jealousies. Fawcett felt elated and stimulated by the older man’s
interest and belief in him, and lost no time in hunting for a political
opening.
He interviewed Lord Stanley, but without results, for, as he reported to
a friend, Lord Stanley ‘thought me, I fancy, rather young.’ And, after
all, he was young—only twenty-seven—but he was determined. He watched
for every chance of a bye-election, and knocked at the door of any
borough where candidates seemed likely to be in requisition.
[Sidenote: Bright and Lord Brougham.]
When he asked Mr. Bright about some Scotch burgh, he was kindly but
firmly advised to wait until his star had risen a little more above the
public horizon. But Fawcett refused to lose time, and made his own
opportunity. An article appeared in the _Morning Star_ which stated that
Southwark, then in need of a representative, had revolted against the
control of its paid agents, and that a committee had been appointed to
look for an independent candidate who would stand upon ‘principles of
purity.’ The following morning Fawcett appeared before the committee.
Bringing with him a letter from Lord Brougham, he introduced himself as
‘of Norfolk Street, Strand, and a Fellow of Trinity Hall, Cambridge.’
His declaration of principles was so satisfactory that the chairman of
the committee consented to preside at a meeting.
[Sidenote: First Political Meeting at Southwark.]
Two good stories are told about this election. There is evidence to show
that Fawcett himself set them in circulation. They curiously illustrate
both his sense of fun and his shrewdness. One tells of his first
meeting. This was held in an inn, and only one reporter came to it.
Fawcett began chatting to him, asked him if he had anything special to
do that evening, and then, as there was no audience, suggested to him to
go home. He offered to send on a résumé of his speech. The reporter
gratefully left, Fawcett then asked the landlord if there was any one in
the ‘parlour.’ There were only a few commercial travellers, but Fawcett
sent his compliments to them and asked them to come in. They joined him
and all started a joyful evening together. In course of time, Fawcett
asked one of the travellers if he would mind taking the chair, which he
did. Fawcett then made a brief speech, and after drinks and a very merry
time the party broke up, whereupon Fawcett wrote an account of the
evening to his friend the reporter, giving the speech from the chair,
which he of course made up, and his own oration.
As there was nothing particular doing, to Fawcett’s surprise, the next
day the London papers came out with a full account of the meeting at
Southwark.
Fawcett went promptly to see the chairman of the previous evening, whom
he found absorbed in the account of the great meeting. ‘Why,’ he
exclaimed to Fawcett, ‘I had no idea I made this speech last night. I
have made speeches before, and I usually remember them! I only had a
glass or two! I cannot see why I should have forgotten this one.’ To
which Fawcett replied quietly, ‘You certainly have been well reported,’
and left the bewildered orator to revel in his eloquence.
Lord Avebury said of this tale, which he had repeated to the writer:
‘Tyndall was much shocked by this story, but I thought that the
cleverness far outweighed the wickedness, and the humour of it appealed
to me greatly.’
[Sidenote: The Mythical Committee Room.]
The other story tells of Fawcett’s mythical committee room. It is to be
remembered that he was quite unknown, and put himself up without support
and with no possibility of winning.
He engaged a very small room and a very small boy to open its door. The
candidate was rarely at headquarters, but his acolyte kept up
appearances by informing any one who called that Mr. Fawcett was engaged
with his committee.
[Sidenote: The Contest.]
He stood for a larger franchise; abolition of Church rates; removal of
religious restrictions; economy; the volunteer movement; the
equalisation of poor rates, and the reform of local government in
London. He proved his principles of purity by refusing to pay a shilling
to influence votes.
His success was immediate. The meetings that followed the first were
crowded and overflowing. His interesting personality drew people from
all parts of London to his meetings, till even the neighbouring streets
were crowded.
But the other candidate entered the field. A campaign was started on
behalf of a Mr. Scovell. This did not open with success. A meeting held
for Scovell broke up in a pandemonium. Fawcett had the satisfaction a
few days later of holding an orderly and overcrowded meeting in the very
same hall.
The opposition now introduced a more formidable candidate in Mr. Layard
(later Sir Austin Henry); the Government and the great employers were
understood to favour him. This opposition seemed to decide the contest
against Fawcett, and his friend Leslie Stephen says that he doubts if
Fawcett ever seriously expected to go to the poll. Nevertheless he had
his committee room duly placarded, though the candidate with his small
attendant guide seems still to have been the committee. Fawcett spoke
every night, and urged without success that a mass meeting of electors
should choose between his qualifications and Layard’s!
[Sidenote: The Speaker’s Eye.]
Of course his opponents urged that Fawcett’s obvious disqualification
was his blindness, and that this was an insurmountable obstacle. The
matter was hotly debated on both sides. All sorts of arguments were
brought up at meetings and in the newspapers. How could a blind man
decide questions about the laying out of streets? Fawcett showed how he
could judge accurately of such things by putting pins in a map. How
could he ‘catch the Speaker’s eye’? This objection amused Fawcett and
his friends greatly. It is true that no member can raise his voice in
the Commons unless able to perform that ceremony. But, as Fawcett
gleefully explained, that mysterious ceremony consists in standing in
one’s place hat in hand, no difficult task for a blind man. It is for
the roving eye of the Speaker to note the standing member and announce
his name to the assembly. He thus gaily disposed of these objections,
and cheerfully asked ‘Mr. Layard to argue with him any point supposed to
require eyesight,’ when he would show his power of dealing with it.
Friends came forward to testify, at meetings and by letter, to his great
abilities, and the editor of the _Morning Star_, which had treated his
first speech so generously, delivered an eloquent oration in his favour.
[Sidenote: Triumphant Defeat.]
Fawcett fought that large borough for a month on less than £250. But the
odds were too great, and he wisely decided not to go to the poll, where
Layard obtained a majority of one thousand votes over Scovell.
Fawcett told a friend that this defeat would ensure him victory at the
next contest. Notwithstanding his optimistic belief, he had still much
to win through. He had shown his power of influencing a constituency,
but he had still to overcome the scepticism in the minds of practical
men as to the capabilities of a blind man, and to create for himself a
support which could be counted on as a more positive factor than mere
popular enthusiasm.