More voices!
Sic. How now, my masters, have you chosen him? Cit. He has our voices,
Sir!--Coriolanus.
From Mr. Combermere St. Quintin’s, we went to a bluff, hearty, radical
wine-merchant, whom I had very little probability of gaining; but my
success with the clerical Armado had inspirited me, and I did not suffer
myself to fear, though I could scarcely persuade myself to hope. How
exceedingly impossible it is, in governing men, to lay down positive
rules, even where we know the temper of the individual to be gained.
“You must be very stiff and formal with the St. Quintins,” said my
mother. She was right in the general admonition, and had I found them
all seated in the best drawing-room, Mrs. St. Quintin in her best
attire, and the children on their best behaviour, I should have been as
stately as Don Quixote in a brocade dressing-gown; but finding them in
such dishabille, I could not affect too great a plainness and almost
coarseness of bearing, as if I had never been accustomed to any thing
more refined than I found there; nor might I, by any appearance of pride
in myself, put them in mind of the wound their own pride had received.
The difficulty was to blend with this familiarity a certain respect,
just the same as a French ambassador might have testified towards the
august person of George the Third, had he found his Majesty at dinner at
one o’clock, over mutton and turnips.
In overcoming this difficulty, I congratulated myself with as much
zeal and fervour as if I had performed the most important victory; for,
whether it be innocent or sanguinary, in war or at an election, there
is no triumph so gratifying to the viciousness of human nature, as the
conquest of our fellow beings.
But I must return to my wine-merchant, Mr. Briggs. His house was at the
entrance of the town of Buyemall; it stood inclosed in a small garden,
flaming with crocuses and sunflowers, and exhibiting an arbour to the
right, where, in the summer evenings, the respectable owner might be
seen, with his waistcoat unbuttoned, in order to give that just and
rational liberty to the subordinate parts of the human commonwealth
which the increase of their consequence after the hour of dinner,
naturally demands. Nor, in those moments of dignified ease, was
the worthy burgher without the divine inspirations of complacent
contemplation which the weed of Virginia bestoweth. There as he smoked
and puffed, and looked out upon the bright crocuses, and meditated over
the dim recollections of the hesternal journal, did Mr. Briggs revolve
in his mind the vast importance of the borough of Buyemall to the
British empire, and the vast importance of John Briggs to the borough of
Buyemall.
When I knocked at the door a prettyish maidservant opened it with a
smile, and a glance which the vender of wine might probably have
taught her himself after too large potations of his own spirituous
manufactories. I was ushered into a small parlour--where sat, sipping
brandy and water, a short, stout, monosyllabic sort of figure,
corresponding in outward shape to the name of Briggs--even unto a very
nicety.
“Mr. Pelham,” said this gentleman, who was dressed in a brown coat,
white waistcoat, buff-coloured inexpressibles, with long strings, and
gaiters of the same hue and substance as the breeches--“Mr. Pelham,
pray be seated--excuse my rising, I’m like the bishop in the story, Mr.
Pelham, too old to rise;” and Mr. Briggs grunted out a short, quick,
querulous, “he--he--he,” to which, of course, I replied to the best of
my cachinnatory powers.
No sooner, however, did I begin to laugh, than Mr. Briggs stopped
short--eyed me with a sharp, suspicious glance--shook his head, and
pushed back his chair at least four feet from the spot it had hitherto
occupied. Ominous signs, thought I--I must sound this gentleman a little
further, before I venture to treat him as the rest of his species.
“You have a nice situation here, Mr. Briggs,” said I.
“Ah, Mr. Pelham, and a nice vote too, which is somewhat more to your
purpose, I believe.”
‘Oh!’ thought I, ‘I see through you now, Mr. Briggs!’--you must not be
too civil to one who suspects you are going to be civil, in order to
take him in.
“Why,” said I, “Mr. Briggs, to be frank with you, I do call upon you
for the purpose of requesting your vote; give it me, or not, just as
you please. You may be sure I shall not make use of the vulgar
electioneering arts to coax gentlemen out of their votes. I ask you
for your’s as one freeman solicits another: if you think my opponent
a fitter person to represent your borough, give your support to him in
God’s name: if not, and you place confidence in me, I will, at least,
endeavour not to betray it.”
“Well done, Mr. Pelham,” exclaimed Mr. Briggs: “I love candour--you
speak just after my own heart; but you must be aware that one does
not like to be bamboozled out of one’s right of election, by a
smooth-tongued fellow, who sends one to the devil the moment the
election is over--or still worse, to be frightened out of it by some
stiff-necked proud coxcomb, with his pedigree in his hand, and his acres
in his face, thinking he does you a marvellous honour to ask you at
all. Sad times these for this free country, Mr. Pelham, when a parcel of
conceited paupers, like Parson Quinny (as I call that reverend fool, Mr.
Combermere St. Quintin), imagine they have a right to dictate to warm,
honest men, who can buy their whole family out and out. I tell you what,
Mr. Pelham, we shall never do anything for this country till we get
rid of those landed aristocrats, with their ancestry and humbug. I hope
you’re of my mind, Mr. Pelham.”
“Why,” answered I, “there is certainly nothing so respectable in Great
Britain as our commercial interest. A man who makes himself is worth a
thousand men made by their forefathers.”
“Very true, Mr. Pelham,” said the wine-merchant, advancing his chair to
me, and then laying a short, thickset finger upon my arm--he looked
up in my face with an investigating air, and said:--“Parliamentary
Reform--what do you say to that? you’re not an advocate for ancient
abuses, and modern corruption, I hope, Mr. Pelham?”
“By no means,” cried I, with an honest air of indignation--“I have a
conscience, Mr. Briggs, I have a conscience as a public man, no less
than as a private one!”
“Admirable!” cried my host.
“No,” I continued, glowing as I proceeded, “no, Mr. Briggs; I disdain to
talk too much about my principles before they are tried; the proper time
to proclaim them is when they have effected some good by being put into
action. I won’t supplicate your vote, Mr. Briggs, as my opponent may do;
there must be a mutual confidence between my supporters and myself. When
I appear before you a second time, you will have a right to see how
far I have wronged that trust reposed in me as your representative. Mr.
Briggs, I dare say it may seem rude and impolitic to address you in this
manner; but I am a plain, blunt man, and I disdain the vulgar arts of
electioneering, Mr. Briggs.”
“Give us your fist, old boy,” cried the wine merchant, in a transport;
“give us your fist; I promise you my support, and I am delighted to vote
for a young gentleman of such excellent principles.”
So much, dear reader, for Mr. Briggs, who became from that interview
my staunchest supporter. I will not linger longer upon this part of my
career; the above conversations may serve as a sufficient sample of my
electioneering qualifications: and so I shall merely add, that after the
due quantum of dining, drinking, spouting, lying, equivocating, bribing,
rioting, head-breaking, promise-breaking, and--thank the god Mercury,
who presides over elections--chairing of successful candidateship, I
found myself fairly chosen member for the borough of Buyemall.