There shall be no money; all shall eat and drink on my score; and
I will apparel them all in one livery, that they may agree like
brothers, and worship me their lord.
SHAKSPEARE.
The day of election at length arrived, and all the parties attended at
the appointed place, each confidently anticipating a successful result.
Of Oakley and Germain the reader already knows rather more than most
electors do of their candidates; but Mr. Stedman requires some further
notice, and as he was not a man ever to say much for himself, something
must be said for him.
He was, perhaps, the most inveterately silent man that ever was sent
to assist in a deliberative assembly; true, as the county member, he
was called upon between four and five o’clock to take a great deal of
walking exercise, in conveying petitions and bills from one part of the
House to another, but the moment public business commenced, he became
as stationary as the pillars against which he leaned, and thus he sat
in sleepy silence, scorning to speak, equally disdaining to listen.
So determined an enemy was he to the principles of free trade, that
having brought a certain stock of homemade ideas with him into the
House, he bonded them up, equally prohibiting his tongue to circulate
those, or his ears to import others. Every progressive improvement he
viewed separately, as if arising abruptly out of a state of things
that existed forty years ago, and therefore, no doubt, considering
it as an uncalled for innovation, met it with a decided, though
not expressive negative. He had a sovereign contempt for his late
colleague, Mr. Medium, who, without attending much more acutely to the
march of events, wished to be thought to have his own ideas about it,
and therefore was constantly and unaccountably trimming backwards and
forwards.
Mr. Stedman was of course supported by all that numerous class, who,
content with the security of their own selfish comforts, avoid even
thinking of the grievances of others, lest an attempt to relieve them
(for any thing they know to the contrary) might diminish the value of
the peculiar advantages they now enjoy. Oakley, on the other hand,
was supported by all those with whom innovation and improvement are
synonymous. Germain was upheld by many mixed motives, though none
perhaps actuating such large bodies as the other two.
And now from every side were crowding into the county town immense
bodies of those to whom was committed the exercise of an Englishman’s
proudest boast--the elective franchise. Most of them had, according to
immemorial custom, been clearing their intellects for a free choice by
unlimited potations at the cost of one or other of the candidates.
Here on one side, as far as the eye could reach, stretched a long
line of the “true blues,” bearing brilliant banners, on which were
inscribed, “Stedman and the Constitution!” “Protestant Cause!” “No
Popery!” “Church and State!” and many other such “wise saws,” which,
with other equally valuable appropriations, the high Tories have for
some time arrogated to themselves as their property.
On another side were seen equally dense masses, decorated with green
ribbons, bearing on their ensigns, “Oakley and Liberty!” “Oakley and
Reform!” and sundry other more enigmatical watch-words, such as “Magna
Charta!” “Bill of Rights!” which, as they are brought out well-dusted,
and displayed in times either of stagnation or scarcity, are supposed
by many who bear them, to mean either “high wages,” or “cheap bread.”
Germain’s partizans shone in the brilliancy of their symbolical
colouring, but they were terribly in want of an appropriate watch-word,
the politics of the party not possessing sufficient force to distil
themselves into ardent axioms; “Germain and Independence!” was
therefore singularly enough chosen as the most apposite motto.
There was an interval of a few minutes after the parties had met,
before they appeared upon the hustings. Germain took advantage of this
opportunity, to advance towards Oakley. “Though I never received any
answer, Oakley,” said he, “to those few lines which I wrote to you,
explanatory of my intention of appearing here to-day, yet I can easily
attribute any such omission to the sufficiently-engrossing occupation
in which we have both since been engaged; and therefore hope that our
competition is entirely political, not personal.”
“How far it may be at all political, I am at a loss to tell,” answered
Oakley; “since I can hardly ever remember to have heard you express any
political opinions. What personal inducements you may have had I as
little know as care.”
It was actually very true, as Oakley said, that Germain had never
appeared to take any deep interest in politics; nor is this strange, in
a young man just of age, to whom no career in that line was yet open,
and to whom every other enjoyment of society was still fresh.
“Perhaps you wish,” said Germain, good-humouredly, “that I had taken
some other opportunity to make up lost time as a politician; but at any
rate, when you talk of personal inducement, I hope you acquit me of
having wantonly interposed to thwart you?”
“In a case entirely between ourselves, if I do not choose to accuse, I
can hardly be required to acquit. But see, the sheriff expects us.”
“Well, you shall not quarrel with me, Oakley, if I can help it, however
much you seem to wish it.”
“I have not the slightest _wish_ on the subject,” replied Oakley
coldly; and here the conversation ended.
The business of the day was regularly opened. Mr. Stedman was proposed
and seconded in a few words by two gentlemen who seemed, like their
principal, to apply their horror of any thing new even to their
speeches, and therefore only repeated the same sentences, which at the
last dissolution had been found to produce the desired effect.
Then, amidst much uproar, Squire Stedman presented himself. He had
not, as may be imagined, much to say, and therefore it was perhaps an
exercise of political candour on the part of his opponents, to take
good care so to interrupt him as to keep him standing, hat in hand, the
usual length of a speech. For no one could deny that he looked “the
Agricultural Interest” to perfection. As a representative of the soil,
he carried an acre or two of it upon his boots and leather breeches; a
flock of sheep would hardly have sufficed for the ample folds of his
cumbrous coat, and the few straggling hairs which the wind shook out of
the mass of powder and pomatum with which his head was amply manured,
showed the care and cost at which poor soils should be cultivated.
During the period he thought it necessary to remain standing, whenever
a comparative calm occurred, he had recourse to one of the watch-words
from his own banners, to appear as if he had been speaking all the
while--“Support our invaluable constitution”--loud applause--louder
yells--“As in duty bound the Protestant Church”--increased tumult.
“Wisdom of our ancestors.”--“Go to them and be d----d,” cried one
voice.--“Ax them about spinning-jennies,” cried another.--“They’ve less
land on their hands than you have on yours, Squire,” said a third; and
amidst enthusiastic applause from his own party, Mr. Stedman retired.
Germain, as the one who had first offered himself upon the present
vacancy, was next proposed and seconded by two gentlemen-like young
men who possessed good property in the county, appeared in new French
gloves, with which they stroked down their well-brushed hats whilst
they made two very neat speeches, of which not one syllable could be
heard, but which were, strange to say, very accurately reported in the
next county paper.
Germain spoke sensibly, and was heard favourably, but not received
enthusiastically; for moderation in language, though very distinct
in character from mediocrity in intellect, is not unlike it in its
deadening effects upon the spirits of a crowd; and he who has one man’s
head in his face, and two men’s elbows in his sides, had rather have
his prejudices flattered, and his passions excited, than his reason
convinced.
Sir John Boreton had at last, after much doubt and deliberation, been
entrusted with the task of proposing Oakley. Lady Boreton had carefully
written out for him on the back of a card the heads of what he was to
say, and he had rehearsed it to her surprisingly well, considering all
things; but upon the hustings an unexpected dilemma occurred. Sir John
could not read without spectacles, and in the confusion and anxiety of
the moment, after fumbling unsuccessfully in every pocket, (no very
oratorical action,) he could not find them; he muttered a few words,
ending in “Ernest Oakley, esquire,” and cast an imploring look at Lady
Boreton, who was posted at a window on the opposite side of the court.
Her ladyship came to his relief, by waving a small green silk flag,
a signal which was answered by the cheers of the populace, and the
seconder luckily took the opportunity of stepping in before Sir John
and taking his place. He was much habituated to this sort of thing,
being a master-manufacturer, who dealt in pins and politics, and
talking was part of his trade. He dwelt much upon the merits of his
“honourable friend, Mr. Oakley.”
Now, though Oakley was prepared politically to stretch a fraternal hand
of fellowship cordially to all his constituents, enough has been seen
of him for it to be supposed that there was something grating to his
not over-easy nature in the idea of the individual familiarity of Mr.
Sims, and though, as the occasion required, he smothered this feeling
as far as he could, yet it rather interfered with the freedom with
which he commenced his address.
But Oakley was gifted with great natural eloquence: that vehemence of
manner, too, which in private often hazarded offence, in public carried
conviction of his earnest sincerity, and the modulated intonations
of his fine voice alone, seemed to challenge concurrence in his
opinions. A fine burst of natural eloquence, from its mere sound,
ensures spontaneous admiration, like the rush of a mountain-torrent,
independent either of the course it takes, or of the depth it covers.
Many parts of his speech were certainly peculiarly indiscreet in the
situation in which he at present stood, as tending personally to
exasperate against him, the supporters of each of the other candidates,
and therefore being likely to lead to a union which would be very
injurious to his interests.
He was particularly severe upon the vehement conduct of some of the
clerical partizans of one of the rival candidates, who, he said, “with
Christian charity as their motto, and political power as their pursuit,
came there to persecute him for refusing to persecute those whose mere
doctrinal differences of religion they made the ground of perpetual
exclusion here, which he dared them in the boldest flight of arrogated
infallibility to assume, would be the ground of any eternal distinction
hereafter.”
But as this work is not meant either as a copy or continuation of
harangues at public meetings, and as the speeches of the other
candidates have not been detailed, neither shall this part of Oakley’s,
nor the concluding portion, in which he expressed unmingled contempt
for the sort of middle line adopted by one of his competitors, who,
with neither the curse of ignorance or intemperance, and with sense
enough to perceive the right line, had not virtue enough to follow it.
This was certainly not conciliatory. But at the time its effect was
rather imposing; it looked like strength, and a superior disregard of
adventitious assistance. Upon the show of hands, the decided majorities
were for Oakley and Stedman. A poll was demanded for Germain, and at
its close on the first day, the numbers were declared as follow:--
OAKLEY 634
STEDMAN 586
GERMAIN 401