The road steam carriage was such a novelty, that people hardly knew

what to make of it, so a Select Committee of the House of Commons upon

it was appointed, who reported thereon to the House on October 12,

1831. The conclusion of the report was as follows:--

"Sufficient evidence has been adduced to convince your

Committee--

"1. That carriages can be propelled by steam on common roads at

an average rate of ten miles per hour.

"2. That at this rate they have conveyed upwards of fourteen

passengers.

"3. That their weight, including engine, fuel, water, and

attendants, may be under three tons.

"4. That they can ascend and descend hills of considerable

inclination with facility and safety.

"5. That they are perfectly safe for passengers.

"6. That they are not (or need not be, if properly constructed)

nuisances to the public.

"7. That they will become a speedier and cheaper mode of

conveyance than carriages drawn by horses.

"8. That, as they admit of greater breadth of tire than other

carriages, and as the roads are not acted on so injuriously as by

the feet of horses in common draught, such carriages will cause

less wear of roads than coaches drawn by horses.

"9. That rates of toll have been imposed on steam carriages which

would prohibit their being used on several lines of road, were

such charges permitted to remain unaltered."

On August 20, 1832, we hear of a steam carriage, constructed by a Mr.

Hancock, intending to make an experimental trip to Windsor, and coming

to grief at Dachet. In November and December of the same year we learn

that a steam carriage, constructed by Captain Macirone and Mr. Squire,

was running about Paddington, and that "the jolting was not much

greater than an ordinary stage coach." In the _Times_ of April 25,

1833, we read of a

"STEAM OMNIBUS.

"Monday afternoon an omnibus, worked by steam on a new and

ingenious principle, was tried on the Paddington Road. The

machine altogether does not exceed the space which an ordinary

omnibus, with horses attached, would occupy, and the appearance

is particularly neat. The body is capable of containing fourteen

persons, the engine dividing that from the furnace in the rear.

The passengers experience no inconvenience from heat, and, coke

being the fuel employed, there is no annoyance from smoke. The

engine works on a crank, not on an axle, and the propelling power

is applied to the wheels by means of iron chains. The chief

recommendation, that which timid persons will consider most, is

that there can be no possibility of explosion. The propelling

power is equal to fifteen or twenty miles an hour; but, even when

the steam is raised to its very highest pressure, there is no

risk, the water being deposited in several iron pipes, or what

are termed chamber boilers, with a valve to carry off the

superfluous steam. The guide, who sits in front, has complete

control of the vehicle, and can arrest its progress

instantaneously. It is intended to ply regularly from Paddington

to the Bank."

Captain Macirone's steam carriage was repeatedly noticed by the

Press, and in 1834 there is an advertisement of a company to work Dr.

Church's steam carriage; but all the schemes came to nought.

When William IV. came to the throne there were practically no railways

for passenger traffic; and it was during his reign that nearly all the

main lines in England were projected. I now marvel at their having

attained so rapid a popularity, for the travelling was very

uncomfortable. The idea of a stage coach was very difficult to get rid

of, and the carriages were subdivided so as to represent it as much as

possible--even their outsides were modelled, as far as could be, to

look like a coach, and to this day a train is, in railway _parlance_,

made up of so many coaches. The first class were padded and cushioned,

but were very stuffy, having small windows; the second class were of

plain painted wood, narrow seats, no room for one's legs, and _very_

small windows; in the third class there were no seats, it was simply a

cattle truck in which every one stood up, and as there was no roof, it

was rather lively travelling in wet weather.

Railways were soon considered as a nuisance to the public, and on

March 30th, at York, an action of _Rex_ v. _Pease and others_ was

tried. It was an indictment for a nuisance against the Stockton and

Darlington Railway Company, which was opened on September 27, 1825. By

an Act of Parliament, passed in 1821, the defendants were authorized

to form a railway from Darlington to Sunderland, and, by another Act

passed in 1823, they were authorized to use locomotive engines

thereon. The railway which, it was agreed, had been formed upon the

line pointed out in the Act of Parliament, was opened for public use

in 1825. Only one steam engine was at first used; but the number

gradually increased till there were seven in operation. This increase

had been rendered necessary by the increasing business on the railway.

For about a mile and three-quarters the railway runs in a parallel

line with the high-road leading from Yarm to Stockton, the two roads

being at an average distance from each other of fifty yards. The

nuisance complained of was the fright and danger which the noise and

the smoke of the steam engines occasioned to passengers on this part

of the highway. A variety of witnesses proved that accidents

frequently happened in consequence of horses taking fright at the

steam engine. Counsel for the railway stated that he was willing to

admit that his clients had been guilty of a nuisance, unless their

conduct was justified by the Act of Parliament, according to the

directions of which, the railway had been formed, and the steam

engines used. He suggested, therefore, that the best mode would be for

the jury to return a special verdict, finding the facts already

proved, and also that the defendants had used the best engines they

could procure, and availed themselves of every improvement offered.

The counsel for the prosecution, after some deliberation, agreed to

the proposal, and a nominal verdict of guilty was recorded.

The first railway opened in this reign was in 1830, the Liverpool and

Manchester, which melancholy event has already been noticed. In

December, 1831, was opened that between Dundee and Newtyle. In 1833

the following railways were projected. The London and Bristol

(G.W.R.), London and Southampton (L. & S.W.R.), London and Birmingham

(L. &. N.W.R), London and Brighton, and London and Greenwich; in 1834

the Great Northern Railway; in 1835 the Eastern Counties Railway

(G.E.R.), and the Commercial or Blackwall Railway. The other railways

opened for traffic were the Leeds and Selby, September 22, 1834;

Dublin and Kingdown on December 17, 1834; London and Greenwich,

December 14, 1836, and Liverpool and Birmingham, July 4, 1837. Besides

these there were many others projected, some of which came to nought.

Take, for instance, one column of advertisements (p. 2, c. 5, _Times_,

April 18, 1836)--South Western Railway, Padstow Breakwater, and Rock

Delabole, Camelford, Callington, and Plymouth Railway, South London

Union Railway, Bristol and Gloucestershire Railway, Margate and

Ramsgate Railway, Ramsgate, Canterbury, Sandwich, Deal and Dover

Railway, Gloucester and Hereford Railway, Harwich Railway, Westminster

and Deptford Railway, and the Great Central Irish Railway.

In fact, the satire in _John Bull_ of April 9, 1836, was not

altogether undeserved--

"There is always a clown in a pantomime who knocks his head

against a door, and tumbles on his nether end, and grins and

distorts his limbs, and does, in short, a thousand feats to make

the ridiculous performance more ridiculous still. In the

pantomime of railroads, in which the tricks are innumerable,

there is a clown, one so supereminently ridiculous, that if

Grimaldi were still young and active enough to wear his blue tuft

and wafer-dotted unmentionables, he would be jealous. The scheme

to which we allude is one called by the sounding name of an

International Railway--London, Paris, and Brussels, by Dover and

Calais; and there are blanks left in the prospectus (and likely

to be left) for the names of French patrons and Belgian patrons,

and provincial directors, and all the rest of it; and the

beginning of the suggestion is, that people are to go to Croydon

in the first instance, as the shortest way to Belgium. Croydon

seems an odd starting-point for Brussels; however, the prospectus

infers that London has something to do with it; how much, we may

venture to guess, by finding that the railroad communication with

London is disavowed before the committee to whom the Bill is

referred. As to Brussels and Paris, they will come, of course,

when once the sea is crossed; but we must say that the Grimaldi

railway, which renders it necessary to proceed by the old mode of

travelling to Croydon in order to be steamed to Brussels, is very

like paying a shilling to be rattled in an omnibus from London to

a field in Bermondsey marsh, in order to climb up a flight of

stairs to be rattled along the railroad at Deptford, at which

place the traveller is suddenly ejected, his object being

Greenwich (after which town the absurdity is delusively named),

which it neither does, nor, thanks to the wisdom of Parliament,

ever will reach; so that, what with the coloured hearse through

the City, before you get to the starting-place in the bog, the

climb upstairs, and the wearisome walk through the mud of the

Lower Road to Greenwich, after you come down again, you would

save exactly six pennies and three-quarters of an hour if you

stepped into a fast-going coach at the Shoulder of Mutton or the

Salopian at Charing Cross, and went slap bang to Greenwich

itself, for the trifling charge of one shilling. This is absurd

for a short affair and a matter of joke; but the railroad from

Croydon to Brussels, for a serious concern and a long business,

'beats Bannagher,' as Mr. O'Connell says."

The Greenwich Railway referred to was opened by the Lord Mayor and

civic authorities, on December 14, 1836, but only as far as Deptford;

and the whole affair seems to have been a muddle. The _Times_ of

December 15 says--

"On the arrival of the several trains at Deptford the occupants

of the carriages were allowed to get out; but here the

arrangements fell far short of what we expected, for no

preparation was made for their return. Many who had got out in

the hopes of being present at the presentation to the Lord Mayor,

and others who wished to regale themselves at some of the

neighbouring inns at Deptford, could not, from the density of the

crowds below the railway, get out; and, on retracing their steps

to the railway, they found it a work of still greater difficulty

and danger to return to the carriages from which they had

alighted. Many who had taken the precaution to notice the name of

the engine which drew the train, and the number of the carriage

which brought them down, got back in the line between two trains,

but were told by the conductors that they could not return by

that way without great risk, for that the trains would return

immediately. In consequence of this, many persons who came down

by the trains went on to Deptford, and thence to town by the

coaches."

CHAPTER XXVII.

Cases of wife selling--Duelling--Cases of--O'Connell and

D'Israeli--Other duels.

There were two amusements somewhat fashionable in this reign, wife

selling and duelling. The former is still in existence, the latter is

extinct in England. The halter round the neck was used when the wife

was sold at market, it being considered that, being thus accoutred,

she was on a level with the cattle, and thus could be legally sold.

Here is a ballad of the period thereon.

"SALE OF A WIFE.

"Attend to my ditty, you frolicsome folk,

I'll tell you a story--a comical joke;

'Tis a positive fact, what I'm going to unfold,

Concerning a woman who by auction was sold.

_Chorus._

Then long may he flourish, and prosper through life,

The sailor that purchased the carpenter's wife.

"A carpenter lived not a mile off from here,

Being a little, or rather, too fond of his beer;

Being hard up for brass--it is true, on my life,

For ten shillings, by auction, he sold off his wife.

"The husband and wife they could never agree,

For he was too fond of going out on the spree;

They settled the matter, without more delay,

So, tied in a halter, he took her away.

"He sent round the bell-man, announcing the sale,

All in the hay-market, and that without fail;

The auctioneer came, with his hammer so smart,

And the carpenter's wife stood up in a cart.

[Illustration: Sale of a wife.]

"Now she was put up without grumble or frown,

The first bid was a tailor, that bid half a crown;

Says he, 'I will make her a lady so spruce,

And fatten her well upon cabbage and goose.'[23]

"'Five and sixpence three farthings,' a butcher then said,

'Six and ten,' said a barber, with his curly head;

Then up jump'd a cobbler, said he, 'In three cracks,

I'll give you nine shillings and two balls of wax.'

"'Just look at her beauty,' the auctioneer cries;

'She's mighty good-tempered, and sober likewise.'

'Damme,' said a sailor, 'she's three out of four,

Ten shillings I bid for her, not a screw more.'

"'Thank you, sir, thank you,' said the bold auctioneer,

'Going for ten. Is there nobody here

Will bid any more? Is not this a bad job?

Going! Going! I say--she's gone for ten bob.'

"The hammer was struck; that concluded the sale,

The sailor he paid down the brass on the nail;

He shook hands with Betsy, and gave her a smack,

And she jumped straddle-legs on to his back.

"The people all relished the joke, it appears,

And gave the young sailor three hearty good cheers;

He never cried stop, with his darling so sweet,

Until he was landed in Denison Street.

"They sent for fiddler and piper to play,

They danced and they sung, till the break of day;

Then Jack to his hammock with Betsy did go,

While the fiddler and piper played 'Rosin, the beau.'"

[Footnote 23: As applied to tailors, "cabbage" means the remnants of

cloth stolen in making up garments. The "goose" is the large iron used

for pressing seams, etc.]

I have eleven cases of wife selling in this reign, copied from the

_Times_, and I have no doubt I have overlooked some more. The first

is--

"SELLING A WIFE.

"The following memorandum (says the _Stockport Advertiser_),

drawn upon a 1_s._ 6_d._ stamp, will best explain the nature of a

bargain between two fellows at a beer shop, in the Hillgate, in

this town. Milward is a butcher, and was last week fined before

our magistrates for using uneven balances in his trading

transactions. The other persons are unknown to us:--

"'I, Booth Milward, bought of William Clayton, his wife, for five

shillings, to be delivered on the 25th of March, 1831, to be

delivered in a _alter_ at Mr. John Lomases house.

"'WILLIAM CLAYTON.

"'Witnesses: Joseph Gordon, G. Wood, George Whalley.'"

The next is from the _Times_, February 25, 1832--

"BUYING AND SELLING WIVES.

"In an evening paper we find the following story: 'A most

disgusting and disgraceful scene happened in Smithfield Market on

Monday last, which at the present day is of very rare occurrence.

About two o'clock in the afternoon a fellow came into the market

leading his wife by a halter, and gave her to a drover, desiring

him to tie her to the pens and sell her to the best bidder. The

woman, who did not appear to be above twenty-five years of age,

and not bad looking, suffered herself to be tied up very quietly.

A crowd of persons soon gathered round, and a man of rather

respectable appearance entered into a negotiation with the drover

for the purchase of the wife; and, after some higgling, she was

finally knocked down to him for the sum of ten shillings. The

money was paid, but the drover refused to release her except on

payment of two shillings as his commission for the sale which he

had effected. Some confusion took place about the demand, but it

was eventually paid, and she was released from the pens, opposite

the Half Moon public house, and delivered to her purchaser, who

appeared highly pleased with his bargain. The parties adjourned

to a neighbouring public house, where the late husband spent the

greater part of the money in brandy and water.'"

The following is from the _Times_ of April 26, 1832 (from the

_Lancaster Herald_), and is somewhat out of the common run of these

affairs:--

"SALE OF A WIFE BY HER HUSBAND AT CARLYLE.

"On Saturday, the 7th instant, the inhabitants of this city

witnessed the sale of a wife by her husband, Joseph Thompson, who

resides in a small village about three miles from this city. He

rents a farm of about forty-two or forty-four acres, and was

married at Hexham in the year 1829 to his present wife. She is a

spruce, lively, and buxom damsel, apparently not exceeding

twenty-two years of age, and appeared to feel a pleasure at the

exchange she was about to make. They had no children during their

union, and that, together with some family disputes, caused them

by mutual agreement to come to the resolution of finally

parting. Accordingly the bellman was sent round to give public

notice of the sale, which was to take place at twelve o'clock.

This announcement attracted the notice of thousands. She appeared

above the crowd, standing on a large oak chair, surrounded by

many of her friends, with a rope or halter made of straw about

her neck. She was dressed in rather a fashionable country style,

and appeared to some advantage. The husband, who was also

standing in an elevated position near her, proceeded to put her

up for sale, and spoke nearly as follows:--

"'Gentlemen, I have to offer to your notice my wife, Mary Ann

Thompson, otherwise Williamson, whom I mean to sell to the

highest and fairest bidder. Gentlemen, it is her wish, as well as

mine to part for ever. She has been to me only a bosom serpent. I

took her for my comfort and the good of my house, but she became

my tormentor, a domestic curse, a night invasion, and a daily

devil. (Great laughter.) Gentlemen, I speak truth from my heart

when I say, "May God deliver us from troublesome wives and

frolicsome widows!" Avoid them as you would a mad dog, a roaring

lion, a loaded pistol, cholera morbus, Mount Etna, or any other

pestilential phenomena in nature.

"Now I have shown you the dark side of my wife, and told you her

faults and her failings, I will introduce the bright and sunny

side of her, and explain her qualifications and her goodness. She

can read novels and milk cows; she can laugh and weep with the

same ease that you can take a glass of ale when thirsty; indeed,

gentlemen, she reminds me of what the poet says of women in

general--

"'Heaven gave to women the peculiar grace,

To laugh, to weep, to cheat the human race.'

"She can make butter and scold the maid; she can sing Moore's

Melodies, and plait her frills and caps; she cannot make rum,

gin, or whisky, but she is a good judge of the quality from long

experience in tasting them. I therefore offer her, with all her

perfections and imperfections, for the sum of 50_s._

"After an hour or two, she was purchased by Henry Mears, a

pensioner, for the sum of 20_s._ and a Newfoundland dog. The

happy people immediately left town together, amidst the shouts

and huzzas of the multitude, in which they were joined by

Thompson, who, with the greatest good humour imaginable,

proceeded to put the halter which his wife had taken off round

the neck of his Newfoundland dog, and then proceeded to the first

public-house, where he spent the remainder of the day."

In the _Times_ of March 25, 1833, is the following:--

"A grinder, named Calton, sold his wife publicly in the market

place, Stockport, last Monday week. She was purchased by a

shopmate of her husband for a gallon of beer! The fair one, who

had a halter round her neck, seemed quite agreeable.--_Blackburn

Gazette._"

The _Times_ of May 24th, 1834, quoting the _Paisley Advertiser_,

says--

"SALE OF A WIFE.

"Monday night a party of doughty neighbours met in a house in New

Sneddon to enjoy a tankard or two of reaming swats, and to decide

by which of the rival 'best possible instructors' they were,

henceforth, to be enlightened. In the course of the discussion,

one of them announced his intention of setting up a dram shop,

and stated that there was only one article wanting. 'What was

that?' 'A wife!' 'A wife!' exclaimed the host--whose name is as

the name of the upper part of the garment in which the humble

daughters of St. Mirren delight to conceal their beauties--'I

will sell you mine for twenty pounds Scots.' Some higgling took

place, in the course of which the virtues of the wife shone out

with such conspicuous lustre that her price was raised to twenty

pounds sterling. This sum the purchaser agreed to pay, a contract

was drawn out, and signed by three witnesses, the conditions of

sale being that the money was to be tabled, and the transfer

completed by next day, at noon.

"Next day came, and found the seller, the purchaser, and their

witnesses once more assembled, discussing at once the terms of

agreement and a can of grog. Some of the witnesses seemed to

think that the joke was carried far enough, and proposed that the

whole proceedings should be nullified on the host forfeiting £1,

to be 'melted,' in the house; but the host was too well up to

trap to be wheedled out of his £20, and saddled with his wife to

boot; he therefore persisted in the fulfilment of the contract,

and, as the purchaser was equally averse to a rue bargain,

arrangements were put in operation to complete the transaction.

"Meanwhile, the wife, whose good qualities may be judged of by

the great rise which took place in her price, while the terms

were under discussion, got a hint of the negotiations that were

pending, and, being a good deal nettled that her opinion should

not have been asked in an affair in which she was so nearly

concerned, sallied out to a neighbouring court, known by the name

of 'Little _Ire_land,' and sounded the tocsin of alarm. A much

smaller matter than the sale of a wife was enough to agitate

'Little _Ire_land.' With _ire_ akin to that which animated the

bosom of 'Cutty Sark' and her compeers, as they sallied out of

Alloway Kirk to avenge themselves on Tam o'Shanter and his mare

Meg, sallied out the daughters of Little Ireland to avenge the

insult thus offered to one of the best half of creation. Every

damsel who could wag a tongue--mercy on us, how numerous a

class!--every one who could wield a poker, fender, or pair of

tongs, flew to arms, and resolved on a simultaneous attack; while

the high contracting parties, and their assistant negotiators

were within, discussing terms, wholly ignorant of the storm that

was brewing around them. How the victory would have gone it is no

way difficult to predict; but before active hostilities

commenced, the police arrived, and conveyed the negotiators to

the office, where they were detained until the vast crowds which

had collected had dispersed, and until security had been given

that appearance would be made next day. There the whole party

were brought before the magistrates, and looked exceedingly

foolish on the occasion. No such an affair as the sale of a wife

seems ever to have been heard of in these northern latitudes,

and, as the fiscal knew from the parricide case of old, that to

prescribe a punishment for a crime was a powerful means to get

the crime introduced, he resolved not to be privy to such a

doing, and, therefore, restricted his charge to a breach of the

peace. The magistrate did not find that a breach of the peace

could be brought home to the parties; and, after animadverting in

severe terms on the disgraceful nature of such proceedings, and

addressing the salesman and purchaser in terms which, we dare

say, they will not soon forget, he dismissed them from the bar.

The purchaser, who is verging on three score years and ten,

seemed to have come into court predetermined to appeal, and

declared that a bargain was a bargain; but, with the whisky still

buzzing in his head, he appealed at a wrong time, and tabled his

shilling before the sentence of dismissal was pronounced."

The lady got the best of it on another occasion, according to the

_Halifax Express_, quoted in the _Times_ of April 4, 1836--

"On Wednesday, May Day Green, Barnsley, was the scene of an

extraordinary encounter. A woman beat her husband on the face

till the blood flew about; he, in turn, sent the bellman round to

proclaim the sale of his wife by auction; but, when he appeared

with a halter to sell her, the Amazon rushed upon him again with

her fists, and put him to total rout."

As a last example,[24] I will give another, which occurred in London,

and which is thus reported in the _Times_ of August 2, 1836--

[Footnote 24: The reader can find others in the _Times_ of March 18,

1833; February 1, and November 2, 1836; and February 9, 1837.]

"SALE OF A WIFE.

"Yesterday morning, between ten and eleven o'clock, one of those

disgraceful scenes, the sale of a wife, took place at the New

Islington Cattle Market. It appears that at about nine o'clock a

man about forty-two years of age, of shabby genteel exterior, led

a well-looking young woman, about thirty years of age, with a

halter round her waist, to Smithfield Market; and, having tied

her up, was about to offer her to the highest bidder; but,

several persons interfering, it was agreed to go forthwith to

Islington Market to accomplish their object; and, in order to

expedite the matter, they jumped into a hackney coach, and were

driven off at full speed, to the spot where the marriage knot was

to be dissolved. They were followed from Smithfield by a young

man of plausible appearance, who on seeing the wife tied up at

Islington Market for sale, bid 5_s._ for her, but he was outbid

by several persons, but, subsequently, became purchaser of the

lot for 26_s._, and conveyed her home in a coach to his lodgings.

The other man walked home, whistling merrily, declaring he had

got rid of a troublesome, noisy woman, and that it was the

happiest day of his life. Surely the police ought to have

interfered to prevent such a disgusting outrage upon Society."

Well! the lower classes of the time were simply animal brutes, with

very little of Arnold's "sweetness and light" in their composition.

Uneducated, ignorant, very seldom moving from one spot, badly housed,

and nobody's care, it would have been a wonder had it been otherwise.

The middle-class were steady-going, stay-at-home people, with not too

much brains, and even of them making but little use--and they were

only emerging from the barbarism which required the solution of any

disagreement among men to be settled by physical force, either by

fists or the duel. It is astonishing to see how these contests fell

off in this reign, as public opinion declared itself against the

practice of duelling.

People of old quarrelled and killed each other about such very

trifles. Colonel Montgomery was shot in a duel about a dog, Captain

Ramsay in one about a servant, Mr. Featherston in one about a recruit,

Sterne's father in one about a goose, and some one else about an "acre

of anchovies" instead of "artichokes." One officer was challenged for

merely asking his opponent to have another glass, and another was

compelled to fight about a pinch of snuff, while General Barry was

challenged by a Captain Smith for declining a glass of wine with him

at dinner in a steamboat, although the general had pleaded in excuse

that wine invariably made him sick at sea.

But when William the Fourth was King, public opinion was set against

the practice, and this was so felt, that quarrelsome persons betook

themselves abroad to settle their differences. This was the case in a

famous duel in 1834, between Captain Helsham and Lieutenant Crowther,

at Boulogne, in which the latter was killed. Captain Helsham stood his

trial for murder at the Old Bailey on October 8th, and was

_acquitted_. In September of the same year Lord Bingham and Major

Fitzgerald met at Brussels, but they did not fight. O'Connell's tongue

got him into many scrapes. In 1815 he shot D'Esterre in a duel. In

October, 1834, he was challenged by Sir Henry Hardinge for having

applied most offensive and outrageous terms of personal insult to him;

but the Irishman refused to fight, which was a wonder, as they were

generally too eager for the fray. Witness a hostile meeting which took

place near Ashbourne, about ten miles from Dublin, on December 23,

1834, between Messrs. Pope and L'Estrange, in which "the

misunderstanding arose from expressions used in the theatre regarding

a lady whom Mr. Pope had attended thither." One newspaper, the _Times_

of October 2, 1832, records three duels.

The O'Connells were particularly fond of duelling. On December 13,

1832, William John O'Connell, nephew of the "Liberator," fought a Mr.

Richard Kearney in the deer park at Greenwich. All the parties

concerned had dined together at the Piazza Hotel, Regent Street, and

afterwards adjourned to some place of amusement, where a row ensued,

and the outcome was a meeting at Chalk Farm the same evening, but as

the evening was too dark, it was adjourned till the next morning, and

came off in Greenwich Park. O'Connell shot his man in the leg, and was

afterwards apprehended by the police, and bound over to keep the peace

for six months. On May 11, 1834, a duel was fought at Exeter, between

Dr. Hennis, a young physician, and Sir John Jeffcott, recently

appointed Chief Justice and Judge of the Vice Admiralty Court, Sierra

Leone. Dr. Hennis did not fire, but was mortally wounded by the judge,

who at once got on board a ship and set sail for Africa, thus eluding

the police. The seconds were arrested, as accessories, but at their

trial were acquitted.

In 1834, Sir Robert Peel challenged both Dr. Lushington and Joseph

Hume, but the causes of quarrel were courteously explained, and no

meetings took place. On May 5, 1835, a duel was fought, in a field on

the Finchley Road, between Lord Alvanley and Morgan O'Connell, son of

the "Liberator." The ground was measured at twelve paces, and it was

agreed that Colonel Damer should give the word, which was to be

"Ready!--Fire!" The parties were placed, and the pistols were

delivered, Colonel Damer gave the words, and O'Connell fired; but not

so Lord Alvanley, who said he thought the words were only preparatory,

and claimed his right to fire. This was disallowed, and another round

was fired without effect. Mr. O'Connell not being satisfied, yet

another was arranged, after which, Lord Alvanley's second declared he

would walk his man off the ground; this also was fired, without

effect, and the duel terminated.

I have now to chronicle a passage of arms which, luckily, was

bloodless, between two celebrities--Daniel O'Connell and Benjamin

D'Israeli. At a meeting of the Franchise Association, held on May 2,

1835, at the Corn Exchange, Dublin, O'Connell stated that he had

something to mention, personal to himself. Of all the abusive attacks

that had ever been made on him, that recently volunteered by a Mr.

D'Israeli, the unsuccessful Tory candidate at Taunton, was the most

reckless, unprovoked, and unwarrantable. All that he knew of this Mr.

D'Israeli was, that he had sent to him (Mr. O'Connell) in 1831, to

write a letter in his favour to the electors of Wickham, for which he

was a candidate in the Radical interest. On that occasion he was

unsuccessful, as well as in a subsequent attempt as a Radical in

Marylebone. Since then he had made some attempts to get into

Parliament as a Tory, and certainly no one was so fit for the Tory

faction as a man who had been twice rejected by the Radicals.

He had called him (Mr. O'Connell) a traitor and an incendiary; and,

having thus grossly and maliciously assailed him, he should not be

restrained by any notion of false delicacy in describing Mr. D'Israeli

in the terms his conduct merited. Here the honourable and learned

gentleman uttered a terrible philippic against Mr. D'Israeli, of which

the following passage is a specimen. In describing Mr. D'Israeli as a

descendant of a Jew (without meaning to cast any imputation either on

the name, or the nation, which he respected) Mr. O'Connell said that

he verily believed that, although the people of Israel were the chosen

of God, yet there were miscreants amongst them also, and Mr. D'Israeli

was one of those, for he possessed the quality of the impenitent thief

who died upon the cross, and he (Mr. O'Connell) was convinced that

that thief's name was D'Israeli. For aught he knew, this D'Israeli

might be his heir-at-law, and now he forgave the descendant of the

blasphemous thief who died impenitent upon the cross.

It is not possible to suppose that Mr. D'Israeli could pass this

calmly by; and he did not, but wrote to O'Connell's son as follows:--

"31A, Park Street, Grosvenor Square,

"Tuesday, May 5.

"Sir,

"As you have established yourself as the champion of your father,

I have the honour to request your notice to a very scurrilous

attack which your father has made upon my conduct and character.

"Had Mr. O'Connell, according to the practice observed among

gentlemen, appealed to me respecting the accuracy of the

reported expressions, before he indulged in offensive comments

upon them, he would, if he can be influenced by a sense of

justice, have felt that such comments were unnecessary. He has

not thought fit to do so, and he leaves me no alternative but to

request that you, his son, will resume your vicarious duties of

yielding satisfaction for the insults which your father has too

long lavished with impunity upon his political opponents.

"I have the honour to be, Sir, your obedient servant,

"D'ISRAELI.

"Morgan O'Connell, Esq., M.P."

To this the younger O'Connell replied--

"9, Clarges Street, Tuesday, May 5.

"Sir,

"I have this day received a letter from you, stating that a

scurrilous attack has been made upon you by my father, without

giving me any information as to the expressions complained of, or

when or where they were used, and which I now hear of for the

first time.

"I deny your right to call upon me in the present instance, and I

am not answerable for what my father may say. I called on Lord

Alvanley for satisfaction, because I conceived he had purposely

insulted my father, by calling a meeting at Brookes's for the

purpose of expelling him from the club, he being at the time

absent in Ireland.

"When I deny your right to call upon me in the present instance,

I also beg leave, most unequivocably, to deny your right to

address an insulting letter to me, who am almost personally

unknown to you, and unconscious of ever having given you the

slightest offence. I must, therefore, request that you will

withdraw the letter, as, without that, it will be impossible for

me to enter into an explanation.

"I have the honour, etc.,

"M. O'CONNELL.

"B. D'Israeli, Esq."

To this Mr. D'Israeli replied that he could not withdraw the letter,

but assured his correspondent that he did not intend that it should

convey any personal insult. On the same day he wrote old Dan a long

and scathing letter, which wound up thus--

"I expect to be a representative of the people before the Repeal

of the Union. We shall meet at Philippi, and rest assured that,

confident in a good cause, and in some energies which have been

not altogether improved, I will seize the first opportunity of

inflicting upon you a castigation which will make you at the same

time remember and repent the insults that you have lavished upon

"BENJAMIN D'ISRAELI."

There was more letter writing, but it never came to a fight.

Willis says that he met Moore at Lady Blessington's, and, in the

course of conversation, speaking of the "Liberator," he said--

"O'Connell would be irresistible were it not for the blots on his

character--the contribution in Ireland for his support, and his

refusal to give satisfaction to the man he is still coward enough

to attack. They may say what they will of duelling; it is the

great preserver of the decencies of society. The old school,

which made a man responsible for his words, was the better. Then,

in O'Connell's case, he had not made his vow against duelling

when Peel challenged him. He accepted the challenge, and Peel

went to Dover, on his way to France, where they were to meet;

O'Connell pleaded his wife's illness, and delayed till the law

interfered. Some other Irish patriot, about the same time,

refused a challenge on account of the illness of his daughter,

and a Dublin wit made a good epigram on the two--

"'Some men, with a horror of slaughter,

Improve on the Scripture command;

And honour their wife and their daughter,

That their days may be long in the land.'"

In November, 1835, Mr. Roebuck, M.P. (commonly known as "Tear-'em"),

and Mr. Black, the editor of the _Morning Chronicle_, fought a duel at

Christchurch, Hants. At the first round Mr. Roebuck fired in the air,

but at the second, both principals fired simultaneously, but no

mischief was done. I wind up this account of duels of the reign, in

which, however, I have not given a tithe part of those that occurred,

with the last one in my notes, taken from the _Times_, June 15, 1837.

"DISTRESSING DUEL.

"Yesterday morning, between three and four o'clock, a meeting

took place in a field near St. John's Wood between the Hon. Henry

D---- and Mr. Robert ----. The parties are nearly related to each

other, and the misunderstanding arose in consequence of an

elopement of a distressing nature. The parties had taken their

stations and were upon the point of firing, when a cabriolet

dashed up the adjacent lane at a tremendous speed, and a lady, in

a wild and hurried manner, rushed up the field towards the party,

but ere she could succeed in reaching them the word 'Fire!' was

given, and one of the combatants, Mr. Henry D----, fell. The

lady, who proved to be the Hon. Mrs. D----, perceiving this,

uttered the most heartrending shrieks, and, rushing to the spot,

accused herself of being the murderer of her husband. The

gentlemen present had the greatest difficulty in forcing her from

the spot. A surgeon in attendance at first pronounced the hon.

gentleman's wound to be fatal; but, subsequently, a consultation

of medical men having been held at the hon. gentleman's

residence, some slight hopes are entertained of his recovery. It

is said that the unfortunate cause of the catastrophe has been in

a state of delirium since the event, and has twice made an

attempt to lay violent hands on herself."

CHAPTER XXVIII.

Smuggling--Its prevalence--Cases--Great smuggling of silks,

etc.--More Cases.

Another thing, which has almost died out, but then was in full force,

was smuggling; but then almost every import paid some duty, and that

on spirits, tea, and tobacco was excessively heavy, and, consequently,

the temptation was very great. Kent and the south-east coast

generally, were the favourite resorts for smugglers, owing to their

proximity to France, and smuggling was a regularly organized business

in which much capital was embarked. Every one on the coast knew

something about contraband trade, and, if they did not openly aid in

it, they certainly did nothing to aid in capturing smugglers. This

rendered the duties of the Excise more laborious than they otherwise

might be; and, as the smugglers were generally in force, owing to the

magnitude of their ventures, the dangers involved in their capture

increased proportionately. Being caught, meant fine or imprisonment to

the smugglers, besides loss of goods; so that if the parties ever

came in collision it was no child's play. We may judge of the

magnitude of the contraband trade by the frequency of newspaper

reports of it, and it must be remembered that the instances chronicled

would represent a very small percentage of runs which were successful

and unheard of. To show their frequency, I will quote three notices in

the _Times_ of January 10, January 22, and February 22, 1831. The

first is taken from the _Hastings Iris_, and begins--

"We regret to have to state that a desperate affray took place on

Wednesday morning, between three and four o'clock, on the beach

in front of Gover's Cottage, about two miles to the eastward of

Hastings, when two men were killed on the part of the smugglers,

and one of the blockade so severely beaten that his life is

despaired of, having his arm broken in two places and five or six

cuts in his head. Another man stationed near to him was very much

knocked about, but was able to give evidence at the inquest....

William Rixon, ex-seaman, belonging to the _Hyperion_, was on

duty on the beach about three o'clock in the morning of Wednesday

last, near Gover's Cottage. A sloop showed a light about two

miles from the shore, and about ten minutes after a boat left

her, which was making for the shore. As soon as she came near he

could see three men pulling, and one man in the stern steering.

He went up under the cliff, and saw thirty or forty men with

sticks nine or ten feet long; they looked like soldiers with

muskets. So soon as he hailed them, another party, which he had

not seen before, ran to attack the two men who were on duty near

him. The first party which he had seen threatened his life, and

said if he would not fire they would not hurt him; but if he

fired they would cut his throat. He immediately fired his musket

for assistance; did not recollect which way he fired; he might

have fired in the direction in which the men stood. They sprang

on him; about a dozen handled him, struck him on the side of the

head with sticks, which forced him to the ground and stunned

him, after which he was senseless for some time; and, as he was

recovering, they struck him again. Some of his comrades came to

his assistance. After the men left him, he found he had been

dragged a considerable way up the cliff. They had torn his

clothes in trying to disarm him. He then went down to the boat

and stood by her until his officer came down and seized her. The

smugglers took his pistols and musket from him. The musket had

since been found, the pistols had not; they were all loaded with

ball cartridge. The duty imposed upon him, in case of the attempt

to land contraband goods, was to resist to the utmost of his

power. He fired as a signal for assistance. The men were on the

cliff rather above him. He fired once before he was knocked down;

but afterwards discharged four or five pieces as signals for

assistance. The men went down to the boat to take the goods out.

He could hear them run up and down the beach as the people laid

on him. There were ninety-three tubs in the boat."

The verdict was _justifiable homicide_.

The next is quoted from the _Kent Herald_--

"On Wednesday sen'night, about nine o'clock, a desperate attack

was made by a party of smugglers on the person of Lieutenant

Ross, the officer in command of the Dover Station Blockade

Service. The object of the smugglers was to prevent any

interference in the landing of a large quantity of contraband

goods, which was taking place not far off, and successfully

accomplished, with the loss of only one bale of silk left in the

boat, which was afterwards captured. Lieutenant Ross was savagely

beaten by five or six of the smugglers, under the very windows of

the magistrates, on the Marine Parade, some of whose servants, we

understand, looked on the affray without offering the least

assistance. At length, the servant of Sir Hussey Vivian coming

up, the fellows made off, and Lieutenant Ross discharged his

pistol after them, the ball from which passed through the window

of a house opposite, but fortunately without injury to any of the

inmates. It is quite time that an ample reduction of duty on

foreign articles should put an end to the 'giant evil' of

smuggling--nothing else can stop it; and, until it is done, the

demoralization and irregular habits of the lower class will

necessarily increase."

The third case is taken from the _Western Times_, and has rather a

comic side to it--

"HOAX ON LORD ROLLE.

"A few days since notices were sent to Lord Rolle that Mr. Swing

was in his neighbourhood; that on a given night there would be

farmhouses pulled down, ricks of corn burnt, and

threshing-machines destroyed; that the labourers would assemble

in organized masses; in fact, the neighbourhood of Bicton would

be subject to Swing law. Lord Rolle very wisely received this

advice with proper caution. All the Preventive Service men from

Salterton and Exmouth, and all the crew of the cutter in the

harbour were summoned to Bicton, where a large quantity of beef

and good cheer was provided. The Preventive men ate the Baron's

beef, and all seemed to enjoy the good cheer of the evening,

which was kept up with great hilarity. On that very night a large

quantity of brandy was landed on the coast. It is suspected that

one or two of the smugglers got themselves sworn in as special

constables, and enjoyed the baronial munificence, as spies, for

the purpose of keeping the Preventive men quiet, while their

companions were running, undisturbed, their cargo on the beach."

But this was peddling work compared with that reported in the _Times_

of August 15, 1831--

"GREAT SEIZURE OF SILKS.

"Information was a short time ago received by His Majesty's Board

of Customs that it was contemplated to smuggle a very large

quantity of silks, and the necessary steps were taken to

counteract the efforts of the adventurers, who were, we

understand, men of high repute for extensive dealings in the

trade. The movements of certain parties were watched both by land

and by water, in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, and in

several seaport towns. At length Mr. Donne, an officer of the

Customs, who was for some time occupied in the search, received

information in the early part of last week that a lodgment of the

expected property had been effected in the city of London, at

the houses of some of the first people in the trade. It was not,

however, stated that the leading men in the establishments were

aware that the goods were contraband.

"Mr. Donne despatched, after having ascertained beyond a doubt

that the silks had been warehoused without the payment of the

duty, three officers of the Excise to three houses, one of which

is in Newgate Street, another in a lane near Cheapside, and the

third in a court in Fleet Street. At three o'clock each of these

officers contrived to lay his hands upon silks of a very valuable

description, upon which the duty had never been paid. The value

of the seizure is estimated at not less than £10,000. It had been

thought proper by the purchasers in the first house to take in a

little brandy, without going through the usual ceremony of paying

the duty, and two kegs of very fine Cognac were found on the

premises and carried off by the officers, along with the more

valuable goods.

"The silks were, it has been ascertained, smuggled from France;

but no clue has as yet been found as to the manner in which they

had been landed. They were packed up with great care in

twenty-four large cases, which were evidently made in this

country, and are such as Manchester goods are usually packed in.

Upon being taken to the King's warehouses they were unpacked and

examined. The gauzes are of a most beautiful kind. The officers

will have the whole of the profits arising from this enormous

seizure, the King having some time ago, as appears from the Order

of the Lords of the Treasury issued at the commencement of his

reign, given up all claim to any advantages arising from seizures

of this description."

We are afterwards told in the _Times_ of December 16, 1831, that the

culprits were Messrs. Leaf, Cole and Co., in Old Change, and

"According to the information laid before the Commissioners of

the Customs, the mode of proceeding seems to have been this:--the

steam vessel from Calais which brought the goods, arriving

generally after night had set in, and the navigation of the Pool

hazardous, was moored at some spot lower down than its place of

destination, thus deferring the making the entries at the Custom

House until the following morning. A waterman, who was regularly

employed with a barge on the river, was engaged by the parties to

lie off the steam vessel, which he was only to approach on a

signal previously concerted. He then received on board his barge

various packages, which he secured by locking up in the cabin.

Consultations were held at the time when the first of these

transactions took place, upon the mode of taking these packages

ashore least likely to excite suspicion. After various plans were

proposed, the expedient was resorted to of using wine hampers,

which were landed at one of the stairs in Thames Street, and

carried by porters to the warehouses for which they were

intended. Another waterman, in addition to the first, was

associated in these transactions, and both of them, if the case

had proceeded, were to have been witnesses on the part of the

Crown. It is not a little remarkable that these men were led to

tell all they knew in the business through some advantage taken

of them, as they conceived, in paying them for a smaller number

of parcels than they had delivered.

"After two or three of these transactions had been completed, it

began to be considered no longer safe to land the parcels within

the precincts of the City; but a place higher up the river, near

Battersea, was resorted to; and, as in this case the distance was

much more considerable, the goods were carried home in carts. At

length, when the number of transactions had amounted to ten or

twelve, the bargemen seemed to have thought the affair ripe for

exposure, and determined on making it. They gave information of

the most precise kind respecting a landing intended to take

place, in the beginning of August last, at the Battersea station.

Persons were employed in different places for the purpose, and a

cart was watched from and to a warehouse in the City belonging to

Leaf and Co., at the door of which the goods were seized by a

proper officer, and notice of it was given to Mr. Leaf, who

happened to be at home at the time. They were afterwards taken to

the Custom House. The total valuation of the goods taken on this

occasion was something under £700.

"A few days afterwards information was given to the same officer

that great bustle existed in the warehouse above-mentioned, and

that persons were engaged there in packing up and removing a

quantity of goods in a great hurry. These goods were traced to

three different places, and seized as foreign, and not having

paid the duty. On examining the packages, they were found to be

filled up in a most slovenly manner, through haste, and so as to

damage some of the goods--gauze ribands, for example. The whole

were returned into the Exchequer, appraised at £5460, exclusive

of the duty, and were claimed by the parties whose property they

were, on the ground, either that they were British, or that they

had actually paid the duty as foreign. They also brought actions

for damages against all the officers concerned in the seizure of

the goods."

There seems to be some grounds in believing this to be the fact, for

Messrs. Leaf and Co. complained loudly that they were not allowed to

prove that they had actually paid duty on the three sets of packages

which had been removed to the shops of their friends after the seizure

of August 5th; but seeing the danger of contending farther with a

public board, they compounded for the whole transaction for a fine of

£20,000.

Here is another case from the _Times_ of January 19, 1832, coming

originally from the _Kentish Herald_--

"MARGATE SMUGGLING.

"An extraordinary discovery has been made here, in the last week,

by the officers of the Custom House, which shows the persevering

and enterprising spirit of the smugglers. The officers went to

search a house in the occupation of a man named Cook, at the back

of Lion Place, near the Fort in Margate, and discovered in a room

below a secret entrance, just large enough to admit a man

crawling upon his knees. The officers proceeded downwards upon an

inclined plane towards the seashore, to the distance of about two

hundred yards, passing under several houses at the depth of many

feet below the surface of the ground, until they reached the

lower entrance, which opens on the north-west side of the Clifton

Baths. The mouth of this entrance was boarded over and covered

with chalk and earth, rammed down in such a manner as to conceal

it completely. There were found, in the interior of the cliff,

several trucks on wheels and implements for the conveyance of

smuggled goods through the tunnel to Cook's house. The work,

which it is calculated must have engaged two men at least

eighteen months in cutting it, and must have cost, in labour,

from £100 to £200, was just finished, and is reported to have

been paid for by a great silk mercer and riband merchant in

London.

"It is fortunate for the Revenue, as well as for the silk trade,

that such a discovery has been made, as the whole plan of

operation was so well projected that, whilst the hide remained

only known to the smugglers, they might at any time, on dark

nights, in the short space of an hour, have smuggled many

thousand pounds' worth of property and carried it off in safety.

It is whispered among the sailors on the pier that, if the

officers had not been a little too eager in the pursuit, they

might, within a week, when the dark nights came on again, have

made an immense seizure; but that now they have entirely defeated

their own object, because not a vestige of any contraband article

was yet to be found upon the premises. This is the second

subterraneous tunnel which has been dug under the same property

within two years, and the second time of the officers being

defeated by their eagerness to grasp so large a prize. It is but

justice to the lessee of this singularly constructed property to

say that not the least suspicion is entertained by the Revenue

Officers of any connivance on his part, he having given them

duplicate keys of the subterraneous excavations and baths, during

the winter months when the property lies unoccupied, and

cautioned them that, unless some of the Revenue Officers were

stationed on the premises throughout the night, it was impossible

to prevent smuggling."

At Hastings, on February 21, 1832, a party of smugglers attempted to

run a cargo near St. Leonards. The Excise heard of it, and a desperate

affray was the consequence; the Revenue men secured the boat and one

hundred and sixty tubs of spirits, but at the expense of their lives;

one was killed and two mortally wounded.

A good idea of the extensive smuggling which was carried on at this

time may be gained from the following paragraphs, which appear in one

column of the _Times_ of February 13, 1832.

"SMUGGLING.

"The examination of the eight smugglers that were captured by the

_Vigilant_ Revenue cutter on the 1st and 4th inst., took place

before the magistrates at Chatham, on Wednesday last; and, being

found guilty of a breach of the revenue laws, were convicted,

and, being disposed of, the cutter sailed for her station on

Thursday. On the following day she made another seizure of 142

half ankers of foreign spirits, which were delivered to the

Customs at Rochester, on Saturday. This seizure is the fourth

that has been brought by the _Vigilant_ into this port within

twelve days, each seizure being the work of a separate cruise;

that is, the cutter sailed to sea, made the capture, and returned

to the port--the time including the cutter's detention for the

trial of the smugglers.

"Smuggling has recently become much more prevalent on the coasts

of Hampshire and Sussex than it has been for some months. This is

to be ascribed, we are told, to the almost total absence of

cruisers in the Channel. If so, where are our Revenue cruisers,

or, what are they doing? If the country can afford to employ but

few vessels, these few should be well-disposed and kept actively

at work.

"The _Mary_ smack, of twenty tons, with two men belonging to this

port, was seized in this harbour on Friday, by Mr. Morgan of the

coastguard, having a false bottom containing sixty-three half

ankers, fifty quarter ankers, and fourteen jars of spirits, with

four canisters of tea, regularly built outside her original

bottom, and executed in such a complete manner that it would have

been impossible to have discovered it but by information, which

we understood was received from the Board."

From the _Brighton Herald_, June 16, 1832--

"A large and most valuable seizure was made at the port of

Shoreham, by the officers of the coastguard, on the morning of

the 13th inst. This great prize to the captors consisted of a

ketch-rigged vessel of about sixty tons burden, called the _New

Speedwell_, of Portsmouth, the boat belonging to her, a large

barge or lighter, which was brought alongside the vessel, and

into which a portion of the goods were unshipped, three men,

being the master and crew; together with 238 bales of tobacco

stalks for the purpose of being manufactured into snuff, weighing

about 1300 lbs.; 27 bales of leaf tobacco weighing about 1100

lbs.; 35 bales of tobacco stalk flour weighing about 1000 lbs.,

and 1 box containing 23 lbs. of cigars, the value of which, it is

said, is estimated at upwards of £3000."

The _Chelmsford Chronicle_, quoted in the _Times_ of May 4, 1833, is

responsible for the following:--

"CAPTURE OF A SMUGGLER.

"A seizure, more valuable than has been made in this and the

adjacent counties for many years, was effected in the Crouch

river in the course of last week. Captain Dodd, master of the

coal brig _Nancy_, of Newcastle, sold his pretended cargo of coal

to a merchant with whom he had frequently traded, and was

proceeding up the river to his destination, when the brig was

boarded by Mr. Read, chief boatman of the Crouch guard station,

who, observing something unusual in the conduct of the master,

and that he left the vessel in an abrupt manner, his suspicions

were excited, and he immediately set about an inspection, which

led to a most important discovery. The coals at the top were

found to be but a thin covering to a cargo of contraband goods,

which, with the brig and crew, were immediately taken possession

of and brought round to Collier's reach, where the cargo is now

unloading; but, the coals being so mixed with the smuggled goods,

present considerable difficulties, as it is calculated that there

are five hundred packages of spirits and dried goods. Those

already landed and safely deposited at the Custom House at

Maldon, some of which were found secreted even in the fore and

maintops, and consisting of spirits and tobacco, are estimated to

be worth £1500; and it is expected that the whole cargo, with the

brig itself, will bring from £3000 to £5000."

CHAPTER XXIX.

Legitimate trade--The "truck" system--Its downfall--State of

trade--Newspaper stamps--Steel pens--Literature--List of

authors--Painters--Sculptors.

But enough of illicit trade. What was legitimate trade doing? The

marvellous expansion which afterwards came, thanks to steam as applied

to machinery, railways, and shipping, had only just commenced; but, at

all events, a beginning had been made, and, thanks to her iron and

coal, England was able for many a long year to head the race for

commerce, hold her own with foreign competition, and even to defy it.

The Trades' Unions, which have not altogether been an unmixed

blessing, were still in their infancy, and in many trades the "truck"

system of paying the workers in kind rather than coin was the rule. It

was the payment of labour in goods or provisions instead of money; and

the mode in which it was carried on by the manufacturers was to set up

a large shop or store (commonly called a "Tommy shop"), containing all

sorts of necessaries for their workmen, so that, instead of paying

them money for their wages, tickets were given to these shops; or, in

other instances, periodical visits to them were allowed to the

mechanic or his wife, and they chose those things they were most in

need of. Under these circumstances money was very seldom, or, rather,

never paid; for, though parties to evade the law gave the money to

their workmen, yet, before they left the premises, it was all received

back again.

These "Tommy shops" were generally kept by some relation or servant of

the master, put in for that purpose; or, when the tradesman did not

resort to such measures on his own account, he made an arrangement

with the retailer, who allowed him a discount. And the more needy the

manufacturer, the greater his advantage under this system; for he was

enabled to stock his shop for three months, and then pay for that

stock with a bill at another three months; so that, instead of paying

his workmen ready money, he was obtaining six months' credit. Again,

without saying that there was a regular contract amongst the masters,

it was always an understood thing that a man discharged for objecting

to this system should not be taken on by any other employer. And,

indeed, this naturally followed; for, when once it was known that a

man had lost his employment by objecting to this mode of payment, it

was not likely that another master, who paid in exactly the same way,

would give him employment.

And the poor fellows had to pay through the nose for all they had. The

milder "truck-masters" were content to charge their men from 15 to 20

per cent. more than the market price, while those unburdened with a

conscience, exacted 100 per cent. profit; nor would they allow their

men to keep pigs. This state of things was well known, and leave was

applied for and given in December, 1830, to bring a Bill into

Parliament to do away with the truck system, and make it penal. On

October 15, 1831, this received the Royal sanction, and the Act was

afterwards known as 1 and 2 Gul. IV. c. 36, "An Act to repeal several

Acts and parts of Acts prohibiting the Payment of Wages in Goods, or

otherwise than in the current Coin of the Realm." And another (same,

c. 37), in which it was settled that all wages must be paid to the

workman in coin, and payment in goods was declared illegal; that

artificers might recover, by law, wages, if not paid in current coin,

and that no employer should have any action against his artificer for

goods supplied to him on account of wages; whilst, if the artificer,

or his wife or children, became chargeable to the parish, the

overseers may recover any wages earned within the three preceding

months, and not paid in cash. That contracts between master and man as

to the payment of the whole or part of wages in goods should be

illegal, and for the first offence the employer should be fined not

less than £5, nor more than £10; for the second, not less than £10,

nor more than £20; and for the third he was to be fined, at the

discretion of the Court, a sum not exceeding £100.

On May 26, 1826, the Royal sanction was given to an Act which

virtually destroyed the monopoly of the Bank of England, and laid the

foundation of the present Joint Stock Banks, or rather what they were

before they took advantage of limited liability. It is 7 Geo. IV. c.

46, and is entitled, "An Act for the better regulating co-partnerships

of certain bankers in England." But it does not seem to have been

acted on in London, at all events till 1833, when we have

advertisements soliciting subscriptions to the London and Westminster

Bank, the Imperial Bank of London, and the National Provincial Bank of

England. The London and Westminster Bank was established March, 1834;

the National Provincial Bank of England in 1833; the National Bank in

1835; the London Joint Stock Bank in 1836; as also the Commercial Bank

of London and the London and County Bank; whilst in 1837 was started

the Union Bank of Australia.

When William IV. died, the trade of the country was in a very

depressed state, as we learn by the _Annual Register_, June 13, 1837,

which quotes from the following papers:--

"We are sorry to say that trade in this district continues in a

very depressed state; and the consequence is, a scarcity of

employment and low wages for the operatives, amongst whom, we

regret to observe, distress prevails to a most deplorable

extent."--_Manchester Courier._

"At Manchester it is stated there are fifty thousand hands out of

employ, and most of the large establishments are working only

half-time. At Wigan, which is not a large place, there are four

thousand weavers totally unable to get work. Unless a stimulus is

shortly given to commerce, persons who have the means of forming

the most correct opinion say that half a million of hands at

least will be idle in the manufacturing districts in the very

worst time of the year."--_Morning Chronicle._

"The pressure upon manufacturers and commerce has at last reached

our county. Within a short time several extensive failures in the

'How of Fife,' along the Leven, as well as in the towns upon the

coast, have taken place."--_Fifeshire Journal._

"A meeting convened by the circular of several gentlemen was held

on Friday, at the Public Office, for the purpose of considering

what measures could be adopted sufficient to relieve the present

appalling state of commercial distress. At this meeting it was

universally admitted that the number of unemployed workmen, and

the consequent distress which prevails, call for the adoption of

prompt and efficient measures; and resolutions were passed

expressive of the deep sympathy felt by the meeting for their

suffering fellow-townsmen and their families."--_Birmingham

Journal._

"We regret that we cannot announce any improvement in the trade

of this town. There has been one failure of a respectable lace

concern since our last. The number of operatives employed by

public subscription on the roads is nearly a thousand. The Relief

Committee, after anxious deliberation, came to the decision on

Monday evening that, in future, the wages allowed could be only

8s. a week on day work."--_Nottingham Review._

When William IV. came to the throne the stamp duty on newspapers was

4_d._, less 20 per cent. discount, and the price of the _Times_ was

7_d._ Each advertisement had to pay a duty of 3_s._ 6_d._ The

consequence of the newspaper stamp being so high was that leaflets

were perpetually being started which bore no stamp, as it was

contended that they contained no news. Still the vendors were always

being haled before the magistrates; but the publication of these

vexatious leaflets was settled in May, 1831, in the case of _Rex_ v.

_William Carpenter_, which came off in the Court of Exchequer, before

the Lord Chief Baron. The Crown obtained the verdict, and Mr.

Carpenter was let off very cheaply, by being fined only £120. The duty

on newspapers brought in a large revenue. In 1830, 30,158,741 stamps

were issued, and in 1835, 32,874,652; but in 1836 the duty was reduced

to 1_d._ per newspaper, and 1/2_d._ for each supplement; and the

_Times_ on September 15, 1836, reduced its price to 4_d._ Of the

number of newspapers I have already written.

Many lived by the pen, whether quill or steel. In 1830, although not a

novelty, steel pens were dear, as we see by an advertisement in the

_Times_ of October 18th--

"PEN-MENDING TOTALLY SUPERSEDED.--Patent Perryian Pens, warranted

not to require mending, and to write better than any other pen

whatever, as cheap as the common pen. Price per packet

(containing nine pens of the best quality), 3_s._ 6_d._"

In 1837 they had got somewhat cheaper, _vide_ _Times_, March 23rd--

"PERRYIAN PENS, protected by five patents.--Double patent pen,

with holder, 2_s._ per card; Indiarubber spring pen, 2_s._ 6_d._

ditto; office pen, 1_s._ ditto. Any of the above, with patent

elastic holder, at 3_d._ extra per card. Under-spring pen, with

holder, 2_s._ per card; side-spring pen, 2_s._ ditto; flat-spring

pen, 2_s._ ditto; three-pointed pen, 2_s._ 3_d._ ditto. Each card

contains nine pens."

This reign saw the commencement of cheap, good literature, which was

to overrun the country and utterly abolish the chap book, which till

then had been the literary mainstay of the country folk. The year in

which this transformation began was 1832, for then were published for

the first time _The Penny Magazine_, and _Chambers' Edinburgh

Journal_; whilst, during the reign, were published all kinds of books,

from the watered-silk-bound annuals, such as the _Gem_, the

_Offering_, the _Bijou_, the _Remembrancer_, the _Coronal_, the

_Iris_, or the _Bouquet_, to abstruse scientific books--for it was, to

a certain extent, a book-reading age, and people bought and kept their

favourite authors.

Of authors, what a lot there was! The following does not pretend to be

exhaustive, but it will serve to give an idea of those who lived or

wrote during the time when William IV. was King. Let us take them

alphabetically. John Adolphus, who wrote the _History of the Reign of

George III._, etc. W. H. Ainsworth, the novelist, who brought out

_Rookwood_ in 1834. Sir Archibald Alison, to whom we are indebted for

his _History of England_. T. K. Arnold, headmaster of Rugby. John

Banim, whom we remember by the _Tales by the O'Hara Family_. Rev. R.

H. Barham, whose _Ingoldsby Legends_ came out with the starting of

_Bentley's Miscellany_ in 1837. The lyric poet, Thomas H. Bayly, whose

_I'd be a Butterfly_, _She wore a wreath of Roses_, and _Oh no, we

never mention her_, are classics in ballad song. Laman Blanchard, who

was a contributor to the lighter periodicals of his day. George

Borrow, who during the reign was an agent of the British and Foreign

Bible Society--to which we owe his _Bible in Spain_. The Rev. Jos.

Bosworth, to whom we are indebted for his _Anglo-Saxon Grammar_ and

_Dictionary_, etc. The Very Rev. W. Buckland, Dean of Westminster,

famous for his writings on Geology and Palæontology. Bulwer-Lytton,

who published _Paul Clifford_ in 1830, _Eugene Aram_ and _Godolphin_

in 1833, _The Pilgrims of the Rhine_ and _The Last Days of Pompeii_ in

1834, and _Rienzi_ in 1835. Thos. Campbell, poet, author of _Pleasures

of Hope_, _Gertrude of Wyoming_, _Lord Ullin's Daughter_, etc. Thos.

Carlyle, who came to London in 1834, and then wrote and re-wrote his

_French Revolution_, which was published in 1837. Captain F. Chamier,

R.N., whose sea tales are only surpassed by Marryat. T. C. Croker, to

whom we are indebted for _The Fairy Tales and Legends of the South of

Ireland_. Dr. Croly, who will be chiefly remembered by his

_Salathiel_. Allan Cunningham, whose _Songs of Scotland_ will always

live. His son Peter, who wrote _Songs of England and Scotland_, and,

among many other books, a _Handbook of London_, which is most

valuable. De Quincey, whose _Confessions of an Opium Eater_ is an

English classic. Thos. Dibdin--son of Charles, of sea-song fame--who

was a most voluminous playwright. Charles Dickens, who published _The

Pickwick Papers_ in 1836. Isaac D'Israeli, who had almost written his

last book. His son Benjamin, who was then beginning to make a

political name. Dr. Doran, who in this reign published his _History

and Antiquities of the Town and Borough of Reading_. Pierce Egan, of

_Boxiana_ and _Life in London_ notoriety. Grote, the historian, was

alive, but devoted himself more to his parliamentary duties than to

writing history. Then, too, flourished S. C. Hall and his wife, the

latter of whom will doubtless live longest in remembrance. William

Hone, whatever may be thought of his politics, etc., has given us a

mine of folk and archæological lore. If genial Thomas Hood had never

written anything but the _Bridge of Sighs_ and the _Song of the

Shirt_, he would have made his name; but, happily, he will be the

source of wholesome laughter to future generations. Theodore Hook,

too, novelist and dramatist, will live in his _Jack Brag_. William and

Mary Howitt are names not likely to be lost. Douglas Jerrold,

dramatist, novelist, and humourist, seems almost of to-day. The Rev.

John Keble will live for ever in his _Christian Year_. Charles Knight,

with his _Penny Magazine_ and _Penny Cyclopædia_, did much to

popularize cheap and wholesome literature. James Sheridan Knowles,

dramatist, produced his play of _The Hunchback_ in 1832, and _The Love

Chase_ in 1837, both classics in the drama. Walter Savage Landor wrote

several books during this reign. Of Mark Lemon, who was "indispensable

to _Punch_" nothing need be said--every one remembers his name. The

same may be said of Charles James Lever, the novelist, whose _Harry

Lorrequer_, _Jack Hinton_, etc., are so well known. Students will

reverence the name of John Lingard, the Roman Catholic historian; and

botanists are familiar with the writings of John Claudius Loudon and

his wife. The _Handy Andy_ of Samuel Lover, novelist, poet, musician,

and artist, though probably written in this reign, was not published

until 1838. Thomas Babington Macaulay, so well known as an historian,

was in India from 1834 to 1838. To mention the name of Captain F.

Marryat is to kindle a thrill in every English boy's breast. Samuel

Maunder, whose _Treasuries_ were text books in their day, and still

are very useful. John Stuart Mill, of _Political Economy_ memory, was

during this reign writing for magazines, when he was not editing the

_Westminster Review_. Thomas Moore, poet and musician, brought out in

1834 a complete edition of his _Irish Melodies_, which were commenced

in 1807. Sir Francis Palgrave produced in 1831 his _History of

England, Anglo-Saxon Period_, and was knighted the following year. J.

R. Planché published in 1834 _The History of British Costume_ for The

Library of _Entertaining Knowledge_. A. W. N. Pugin, the revivalist of

mediæval architecture, wrote thereon, in 1836, _Contrasts; a parallel

between the noble edifices of the 14th and 15th Centuries and the

Present Day_. _Table Talk_ Rogers was getting an old man; and Robert

Southey was Poet Laureate with, in 1834, a pension of £300 per annum.

The "bitter Bengalee," W. M. Thackeray, came of age in 1832, and his

first regular literary employment was for _Fraser's Magazine_,

wherein _The History of Samuel Titmarsh, and The Great Hoggarty

Diamond_ appeared during 1837-38. Nor, in this list, must be forgotten

painstaking John Timbs, whose works are indispensable for reference.

John Wilson, perhaps better known as Christopher North, contributed

his celebrated _Noctes Ambrosinæ_ to _Blackwood's Magazine_ up to

1835; in which year Wordsworth published his _Yarrow revisited_.

Nor must we omit mention of the fair sex in their literary work. Mrs.

Sarah Austin, who produced two of her famous translations in this

reign--viz. _A Tour in England, Ireland, and France by a German

Prince_ (1832), and _Raumer's England in 1835_, in 1836; in which year

Joanna Baillie published three volumes of dramas. In 1836, also, Mrs.

Bray brought out her _Borders of the Tamar and the Tavy_. The Brontës

were too young to write, but were young women. E. M. Barrett Browning

produced her first acknowledged work, a translation of _Prometheus

Bound_, and some of her early poems in 1835. Maria Edgeworth was

getting too old to write; and Mrs. Gaskell had not commenced. Mrs.

Jameson published her first book in 1831--_Memoirs of Female

Sovereigns_, and, in 1837, _Sketches of Germany_. Letitia Elizabeth

Landon (L. E. L.) wrote her best prose work, _Ethel Churchill_, in

1836. Miss Mitford published a fifth series of _Our Village_ in 1832.

Hannah More died in 1833. Lady Morgan, _The Wild Irish Girl_, was

writing, and making money by it. The Hon. Mrs. Norton, who let all

the world know her grievances, brought out her poem of the _Undying

One_ in 1831, and her novel of _Stuart of Dunleath_ in 1835. Miss Jane

Porter produced, in 1831, what was probably her best work, _Sir Edward

Seaward's Diary_, which was frequently mistaken, at the time, for

genuine history. And last, though not least, Miss Agnes Strickland

published the _Pilgrims of Walsingham_ in 1835.

I had almost forgotten; which would have been inexcusable, that Sir

Walter Scott died in September, 1832.

The New British School of Art was just commencing. The National

Collection of pictures was commenced in 1824, and in 1832 Parliament

voted £15,000 to build a gallery for their reception. The Royal

Academy of Arts, instituted in 1768, held their annual exhibition of

pictures, up to 1836, at Somerset House, but in 1837 they removed to

the new National Gallery. There were, besides, exhibitions of

paintings held by the Society of British Artists, the Society of

Painters in Water Colours, and the New Society of ditto. In May, 1834,

there was an Exhibition of the works of the Old Masters; and in 1832

Haydon held an exhibition of his own pictures.

The following is an attempt at a list of the principal British artists

of the reign.

Sir Wm. Allan, P.R.S.A. and R.A.; Sir Wm. Beechey, R.A.; Wm. Boxall;

Sir A. W. Callcott, R.A.; G. Cattermole; A. E. Chalon, R.A., and J.

J. Chalon, A.; Geo. Chambers; J. Constable, R.A.; E. W. Cooks, R.A.;

A. Cooper, R.A.; T. S. Cooper; D. Cox; T. Creswick; F. Danby; P. De

Wint; W. Dyce; Sir C. Eastlake, R.A.; A. L. Egg, R.A.; A. Elmore; Wm.

Etty, R.A.; A. V. C. Fielding; Sir F. Grant, R.A.; L. Haaghe; J. D.

Harding; Sol. A. Hart, R.A.; B. R. Haydon; Sir Geo. Hayter; J. R.

Herbert; J. F. Herring; Wm. Hilton, R.A.; Wm. Hunt; G. Lance; Chas.

and Edwin Landseer; C. R. Leslie, R.A.; J. F. Lewis, R.A.; J. Linnell;

D. Maclise, R.A.; J. Martin; W. Mulready, R.A.; Jos. Nash; Alex.

Nasmyth; T. Phillips, R.A.; H. W. Pickersgill, R.A.; P. F. Poole; W.

H. and J. B. Pyne; R. R. Reinagle, R.A.; Sir M. A. Shee, P.R.A.; W. C.

Stanfield; T. Stodhard, R.A.; F. Stone; G. Stubbs; J. M. W. Turner,

R.A.; J. Varley; J. Ward, R.A.; Rd. Westall, R.A.; Wm. Westall, A.;

and Sir D. Wilkie, R.A.

Among illustrators of books were H. K. Browne (_Phiz_), George

Cruikshank, John Doyle (H.B.), John Leech, Kenny Meadows, and John

Tenniel.

Engravers numbered amongst them E. F. and W. Finden, R. Graves,

A.R.A., William Holl, and Thomas Landseer.

There was a glorious list of sculptors: W. Behnes, Sir F. Chantrey,

R.A., J. H. Foley, R.A., John Gibson, R.A., John Hogan, T.

Thornicroft, Henry Weekes, R.A., Sir R. Westmacott, and his son

Richard, and M. C. Wyatt, while akin to sculpture comes William Wyon,

R.A., medallist.

CHAPTER XXX.

Musicians--Paganini--His avarice--Ole Bull--Curious musical

instruments--Jim Crow--The opera and its singers--The

ballet--Actors, etc.--Madame Vestris's leg.

In music we had, as composers, Balfe, who is more honoured abroad than

at home, John Barnett, Julius Benedict, W. Sterndale Bennett, Sir

Henry Bishop, Michael Costa, J. B. Cramer, Moscheles, Sir George

Smart, and Vincent Wallace. As English singers, Braham and Phillips,

Madame Carodori Allan, Madame Anna Bishop, Miss Stephens, Clara

Novello, Adelaide Kemble, and Miss Paton.

In 1831 Paganini came to England, and gave his first concert on June

3rd at the King's Theatre. He began badly--he raised the prices, and

the people would not stand it, and he only gave way at the last

moment, as we see by the following letter in the _Times_ of June 2nd,

addressed to the editor.

"SIR,

"The evening of my first concert in the King's Theatre is now so

near, that I feel the duty of announcing it myself, to implore

the favour of the English nation, which honours the arts as much

as I respect it.

"Accustomed, in all the nations of the Continent, to double the

ordinary prices of the theatres where I have given my concerts,

and little instructed in the customs of this capital, in which I

present myself for the first time, I did believe that I could do

the same; but, informed by many of the journals that the prices

already established there are higher than those on the Continent,

and having myself seen that the observation was just, I second,

willingly, the desire of a public, the esteem and good will of

which I ambition as my first recompense.

"PAGANINI."

As it was, the prices were high enough. The boxes the same as on opera

night, orchestra and stalls, £1 1_s._; pit, 10_s._ 6_d._; gallery,

5_s._

His avarice was notorious, as noted in the following verses, which

appeared in _The Original_ of July 28, 1832.

"A NOTE OF ENQUIRY, ADDRESSED TO PAGANINI.

"Grant me reply, great Fiddler, to a word

Of question by my sympathy preferr'd;

Ah! do not fail:--

This wound that dooms thy fiddle to be dumb,

_Which_ part of thy extraordinary thumb

Doth it assail?

Doth it at side, or joint, its mischief make?

Or is it, like the money thou dost take,

_Down on the nail_?"

In a notice of his first concert, the _Times_ says--

"The personal appearance of Paganini is remarkable. He is a tall,

thin man, with features rather emaciated, pale complexion, a

sharp, aquiline nose, and a keen eye, the expression of which is

greatly heightened when he is animated by his performance. His

hair, which is dark, is worn long behind, and combed off the

forehead and temples, in a manner which gives an air of great

simplicity to his countenance. He seems to be about fifty years

of age.

"The enthusiasm which his performance excited last night among

the audience certainly surpassed anything of the kind within

these walls. Every _tour de force_ and striking passage was not

only applauded, but cheered by the whole audience, and some of

the variations were encored. At the end of every performance, and

especially after the last, the applause, cheering, and waving of

handkerchiefs and hats, altogether presented a most extraordinary

scene. Foreigners, who have been present at his concerts in

several other parts of Europe, remarked that the applause

bestowed, and the enthusiasm excited last night, were greater

than they had ever witnessed before."

[Illustration: Paganini.]

The King gave him a diamond ring, and money rolled in to him. His

prices were high, and he always insisted upon being paid before he

would perform. Here is an example (_Times_, December 8, 1831)--

"BRIGHTON. December 6th.--Some sensation has been excited at

Brighton by a circumstance relative to Paganini. Mr. Gutteridge,

it appears, had engaged the Signor to play at the theatre for one

night, at the moderate sum of 200 guineas. As the theatre,

however, when crammed almost to suffocation, would only produce

about £200, and, after paying Paganini and other expenses, he

would have had to disburse nearly £300, Mr. Gutteridge was, of

course, compelled to raise the prices. It was, therefore,

announced that the prices of the boxes and pit would be doubled,

and the admission to the gallery increased to 4s. The

announcement of the intended increase of prices caused

considerable dissatisfaction in Brighton, and placards were,

yesterday, posted on the Steine, calling upon the public to

resist the extortion, and threatening, if the prices were raised,

to make of Brighton another Bristol. Mr. Gutteridge, having

obtained one of the placards, went to the magistrates to ask for

protection against the threatened outrage, and a promise was, of

course, made to him of the assistance of the police."

In November, 1833, a Mr. Freeman sued Paganini for thirty guineas,

alleged to be due to him for his services as interpreter and agent,

and in the course of the trial it came out that Paganini had amassed

£30,000 in England alone.

His rival, the celebrated Norwegian violinist, Ole Bull, came over

here in 1836, and gave his first concert at the King's Theatre on May

21st of that year, and the criticism upon his performance was that

"the applause he received was unbounded, as little forced, and as

sincere as any we have ever heard." He stayed in England a year.

It is said that "there is but one step from the sublime to the

ridiculous," and, musically, that seems to be from Paganini and Ole

Bull to Eulenstein, the performer on the Jew's harp, who was here in

the autumn of 1833. In a biographical account of him we find that he

was of humble origin, and born in Wurtemberg.

"He went to Stutgard, and received a command to appear before the

queen. Pursuing his travels, he visited Paris, with five pounds

in his pocket, and five hundred in his imagination. Here he found

no means of making himself known, and sunk gradually into penury;

when Mr. Stockhausen took him by the hand, and procured him

introductions to the highest circles. From France he came to

England, but, upon his arrival, unfortunately, he received a

'patronizing invitation' to play at a rout at the Marchioness of

Salisbury's. A French horn would have been more appropriate there

than the delicate Jew's harp. The gay party saw, indeed, a man in

a corner doing something, and making wry faces over it, they

heard no sound, and wondered what it was. Eulenstein, shocked and

mortified, determined to leave England, and was about to set off

for the Continent, when the Duke of Gordon kindly patronized him,

procured a command from the late King to play in his presence,

and, in short, may be considered to be the architect of his

promising fortune."

The accordion was a new and fashionable instrument, and there was in

1836 a musical instrument called an "Æolophone," which I fancy must

have been a kind of Æolian harp; and in 1837 there was an awful thing

called the "Eidophusion," whilst, all during the reign, a composite

instrument, called the "Apollonicon," was performed on daily at 101,

St. Martin's Lane.

Whilst on the subject of music in England, I must not omit to mention

the commencement of a peculiar school, which since has attained large

dimensions--I mean the "nigger" songs, of which the first was sung in

1836 by an actor named T. D. Rice, who introduced it at the Adelphi,

in a play called "A Flight to America." Although very silly stuff, it

became the rage, and I reproduce it because it was the first of its

kind. It will be noted that the nigger costume was not of that

exaggerated and complex character into which it has now developed.

[Illustration: Jim Crow.]

"I cam from ole Kentucky,

A long time ago,

Where first I larn to wheel about,

And jump Jim Crow.

_Chorus._ Wheel about, and turn about,

And do jis so,

Eb'ry time I wheel about,

I jump Jim Crow.

"I us'd to take him fiddle,

Eb'ry morn and afternoon,

And charm the ole Buzzard,

And dance to the Racoon.

Wheel about, etc.

"I landed fust at Liverpool,

Dat place of ships and docks,

I strutted down Lord Street,

And ask'd de price of stocks.

Wheel about, etc.

"I paid my fare den up to Town,

On de coach to cut a dash,

De axletree soon gave way,

And spilt us wid a smash.

Wheel about, etc.

"I lighted den upon my head,

All in de nassy dirt,

Dey all thought dat I war dead,

But I laughed and wasn't hurt.

Wheel about, etc.

"Dis head, you know, am pretty tick,

Cause dere it make a hole,

On de dam macadamis road,

Much bigger dan a bowl.

Wheel about, etc.

"When I got into Lunnon,

Dey took me for a savage,

But I was pretty well behaved,

So I 'gaged with Massa Davidge.

Wheel about, etc.

"Dem young Jim Crows about de streets,

More like a Raven rader,

Pray good people don't mistake,

Indeed, I'm not dere fader.

Wheel about, etc.

"Dem urchins what sing my song,

Had better mind dar books,

For anyhow dey can't be Crows,

You see d'ar only Rooks.

Wheel about, etc."

For some reason or other this buffoonery became a perfect rage; there

were Jim Crow hats, Jim Crow coats, neckerchiefs, etc.; nay, it even

was made use of in political satire.

There were frequently two opera companies singing at the same time;

one German, of not much account, the other Italian, which included

names which are historical in the musical world. Among the men were

Garcia, Lablache, Rubini, and Tamburini, and among the ladies were

Albertazzi, Garcia, Grisi, Malibran (who died in 1836), and Pasta. And

they were well paid, as we see from an extract from the _Town_, quoted

in the _Times_ of May 20, 1833--

"OPERA CHARGES.

"The following sums are paid nightly to the performers at the

King's Theatre: Pasta, £200, Taglioni, £120, Rubini, £100,

Tamburini, £100, Donzelli, £50, Zuchelli, £50. Madame Pasta will

receive £3500 for the season; and the amount payable to the

principal characters alone, on the rising of the curtain, is

above £1000."

The _premières danseuses_ were Taglioni, the two Elslers, Carlotta

Grisi, and Duvernay, who married a country banker, Mr. Lyne Stephens,

and who died enormously rich, either late in 1894 or early in 1895,

when her collection pictures, etc., were sold at Christie's, and

fetched fabulous prices. A great male dancer was Perrot.

It is an easy transition from opera to the drama, and among actors we

find the names of Paul Bedford, J. B. Buckstone, T. P. Cooke, A.

Ducrow, W. Farren, J. P. Harley, Chas. J. Kean, R. Keeley, C. Kemble,

J. Liston, W. C. Macready, John Parry, J. Phelps, J. Reeve, J.

Vandenhoff, B. Webster, F. H. Yates, and C. M. Young. Among actresses

I may mention Madame Celeste, Mrs. Glover, Mrs. Honey, Fanny Kemble,

Mrs. Nisbet, Miss Ellen Tree (afterwards Mrs. Chas. Kean), Miss

Vandenhoff, and Madame Vestris.

During this reign died several veterans of the stage. In 1831 died

Mrs. Siddons and Elliston; in 1832, Munden; in 1833, Edmund Kean; in

1836, Richardson, the showman; and in 1837, the famous clown, Joey

Grimaldi.

There were besides two names not to be forgotten, not belonging to

professors of the legitimate drama, but yet worthy in their way to be

chronicled--namely, Charles Matthews, who died in 1835, famous for his

"At Home," and his "Monopolylogue," and "Love, the Polyphonist."

There was a curious police case in 1831, _re_ a curious subject--no

less than Madame Vestris's leg; and the following is a portion of the

case as reported in the _Times_ of January 21st:--

"MARLBOROUGH STREET.--A young man was brought into this office a

few days ago, charged with stealing and disposing of, on his own

account, and for his own use, the casts of several figures in

plaster of Paris and other compositions, the property of Mr.

Papera, the celebrated Italian modeller, in whose service the

prisoner lived as journeyman, and the offence charged being

clearly supported by evidence, the young man was fully committed

for trial.

"Yesterday Mr. Papera applied again to the sitting magistrate,

for advice how to act in a case in which he had to charge the

young man in prison with an offence of much more enormous nature

than that for which he had been committed to take his trial.

"Since the investigation of the former case, Mr. Papera said, he

had discovered that several of 'Madame Vestris's legs' were

exhibited for sale in the shop windows of various artists about

town, and on an inspection of these legs, he immediately

recognized them as his property, and they must have been stolen

from his premises by the prisoner and sold by him.

"The magistrate inquired what sort of legs they were?

"Mr. Papera said they were casts of Madame Vestris's leg to a

little above the knee and including the foot.

"The magistrate asked if such casts could not have been made by

other artists, so as to render it difficult for Mr. Papera to

identify them as belonging to him.

"Mr. Papera said it was impossible these casts could have been

made by any other artist, because he was the only person to whom

Madame Vestris had ever 'stood' to have a cast taken of her leg,

and from that cast he had made one mould or model, and only one,

and that was always kept with the greatest care under lock and

key, except when required to be used in his model room, so that

no person could possibly obtain access to it, except some one in

his employ; and, as for any attempt at imitation, that was

impossible to do with success, for so beautiful and perfect was

the symmetry of the original, that it was from it alone the

various natural niceties of the complete whole could be acquired

and to perfection formed.

"The magistrate asked Mr. Papera if he kept these legs ready made

in his establishment, and if in that state they were stolen by

the prisoner?

"Mr. Papera said no; they were too rare and valuable an article

to be kept ready made in the ordinary way of common shop legs,

and were only made to 'order'--that is, when especially ordered

by artists or amateurs."

On February 22nd the young man was tried at the Old Bailey and

acquitted.

CHAPTER XXXI.

Architects and civil engineers--Men of science--Scientific

societies--Medical men--Lawyers--"Tracts for the Times"--Curates'

pay--Flogging in the army and navy--Crime--Transportation

_versus_ hulks--Stories of convicts.

This was a reign in which both architecture and civil engineering were

nascent, and yet there were some famous men in both professions. Among

the former were Sir Chas. Barry, R.A., J. P. Deering, R.A., P.

Hardwick, R.A., Sir Robert Smirke and Sydney Smirke, both R.A.'s, Sir

John Soane, and Sir William Tite. Whilst among civil engineers we may

note G. P. Bidder, once the famous calculating boy, both the Brunels,

Sir W. Fairbairn, Sir John Rennie, and both the Stephensons; and, as a

mechanical engineer, Joseph Whitworth was preparing the mathematical

exactness of the tools which enabled England to hold her own, and

more, against the whole world in the manufacture of machinery.

Of the men of science there is a fine list. Sir David Brewster, C. R.

Darwin, M. Faraday, Sir John F. W. Herschel, and his wonderful aunt

Caroline, Sir W. J. Hooker, to whom botany owes so much, as does

geology to Sir Charles Lyell, and Sir J. Murchison, Mrs. Somerville,

whose scientific attainments were marvellous, and W. H. Fox Talbot, by

whom photography was much developed, though still in its infancy. In

chemistry, we have Ure, Brande and Herapath.

The scientific societies inaugurated in this reign are as follows: in

1831, Royal Dublin Society, Harveian Society, British Association; in

1832, British Medical Association; 1833, Entomological Society; 1834,

Statistical Society; 1837, Ornithological Society. In mechanical

science both the gas engine and Ericson's caloric engine were known,

the air-gun and limelight were novelties, and the hydro-oxygen

microscope was a source of wonder to thousands.

A fine list, too, is to be found of medical men. Richard Bright, Sir

B. Brodie, Sir R. Christison, Sir C. M. Clarke, Sir William Fergusson,

Sir W. Laurence and Sir Charles Locock. Homeopathy was only just

beginning to be talked about at the end of the reign.

There were some fine lawyers, Lord Abinger, Baron Alderson, Lord

Brougham, Isaac Butt, Thomas Chitty, Sir A. J. E. Cockburn, Sir J. T.

Coleridge, Lord Denman, Sir Fitzroy Kelly, Lord Lyndhurst, and Sir

Frederick Thesiger, afterwards Lord Chelmsford.

Among the higher dignitaries of the Church of England in this reign

were very few men of note,--all good men, doubtless; but, since the

Wesleyan revival, the Church had been getting a wee bit sleepy, and

wanted waking up. And it was woke up with a vengeance, when a

conference of some Anglican clergymen and others was held at Hadleigh,

July 25-29, 1833, and Oriel College may be said to be its birthplace,

for at that College were Keble, Pusey, Newman, and Froude. From the

tracts which were issued, exemplifying the views of these writers, the

movement obtained the name of Tractarian. The first tract proper

appeared September 9, 1833, and by November, 1835, seventy had

appeared; and at first they were almost universally welcomed, for they

carefully respected the Prayer-book, and defended the rights of the

clergy. But the Evangelical party became alarmed at this growing

popular movement, and, in the early part of Queen Victoria's reign,

the strife waxed fast and furious, which only infused wakefulness and

life into a somewhat dormant church, and has ended, as far as our time

go, in the establishment of a so-called "High Church" form of worship,

which would have utterly astonished the originators of the movement.

True, some few good men left the Church of England, and joined that of

Rome, but their secession only served as warnings to others, and the

Church of England is now firmer established than ever it was.

A Clergy Act had been passed, enjoining that a curate's pay should in

no case be less than £80 per annum; and that such salary should not be

less than £100 per annum in any parish or place where the population,

according to the last parliamentary returns, should amount to three

hundred persons; where the population should amount to five hundred,

the salary was not to be less than £120, and £150 if the population

amounts to a thousand. This Act was much needed, as the following

figures show. Six curates received under £20; 59 under £30; 173 under

£40; 441 under £50; 892 under £60; 300 under £70; 415 under £80; 458

under £90; 156 under £100; 500 under £110; 69 under £120; 207 under

£130; 52 under £140; 32 under £150; 162 under £160; 26 under £170; 15

under £180; 5 under £190; 3 under £200; 17 under £210; 2 under £220; 2

under £240; 3 under £250; 4 under £260; 1 under £290; 2 under £310; 1

under £320, and 1 under £340. There were forty-three who received the

full income of the benefices they served. Two received one half of the

income, and one was paid two guineas each Sunday.

The army and navy had very few opportunities of distinguishing

themselves; they had a well-earned rest after 1815, but they were slow

in doing away with the old bad practices in force in both services.

For instance, flogging is still in force for some offences in the

navy, by the regulations issued on December 18, 1871. Abolition of

flogging in the army, at all events in time of peace, was advocated in

Parliament in 1836, but came to nought; this was, however, done in

April, 1868, and altogether abolished in April, 1881.

What flogging in the army was like, we may see by the following police

report, taken from the _Times_ of May 18, 1833:--

"MANSION HOUSE.--Yesterday, a soldier, named George M'Willen,

aged twenty-one years, was brought before the Lord Mayor, charged

by a soldier with having deserted from the 77th Regiment.

"William Rogers, a private in the army, stated that the prisoner

had admitted to him that he had deserted from his regiment.

"The Lord Mayor (to the prisoner): Did you acknowledge that you

deserted?

"Prisoner: Yes, my lord, but not till he told me I was a

deserter; I was not quite such a fool.

"The Lord Mayor: Why did you desert from your regiment?

"Prisoner: Because I was tired of flogging. I am only twenty-one

years of age, and I have received nine hundred lashes. (Here were

some expressions of surprise and disgust.)

"The Lord Mayor: Did I hear you rightly? Did you say nine hundred

lashes?

"Prisoner: No doubt of it, my lord.

"Mr. Hobler: It is impossible, if you received nine hundred

lashes, you can stand up so straight.

"Prisoner: I received them all, and I can show the marks. It is

true I received them at different times; but I've had them all.

"The Lord Mayor: And what have you been doing with yourself since

you deserted?

"Prisoner: I have been mining in Cornwall. I thought it would be

the best way of getting out of danger by going underground.

"The Lord Mayor: And why didn't you stay in Cornwall? Why did you

come to London?

"Prisoner: I don't know why I left Cornwall; but I was looking

for work when I was taken up for deserting. I am able for any

sort of labour.

"The Lord Mayor: Why were you flogged?

"Prisoner: I'd rather not say anything about that; I shall soon

have to answer again.

"Mr. Hobler: You unfortunate fellow, you must have been a great

violator of discipline, or you could not have been so dreadfully

punished.

"The Prisoner (shaking his head): I've had my share.

"The Lord Mayor: Tell me, are you a sober man?

"Prisoner: No, my lord; I can't say I am.

"The Lord Mayor: By how many Courts Martial have you been tried?

"Prisoner: By four. In Belfast I was sentenced to receive 500

lashes, but they only gave me 300; they forgave me 200. In

Londonderry they gave me 250. He mentioned two other places, in

one of which he received 200, and in the other 150. He had

deserted eight months ago, and had been a miner ever since, and

the very first day he ventured to town he was apprehended.

"The Lord Mayor: You must be incorrigible, or you would never

have been so dreadfully punished. I cannot help committing you."

In _Arnold's Magazine_ for September, 1833, a writer, speaking of

flogging in the navy, says--

"I saw two men who were tried for desertion, and their sentence

was to receive 500 lashes round the fleet. There is, perhaps,

nothing on the face of the earth so revolting to human nature, as

this most brutal of all outrages upon the feelings of gallant

tars under such a sentence. The day the man is to be punished is

known by the admiral making a general signal to copy orders. A

midshipman from each ship goes on board the admiral's ship with a

book, and copies the order, which states that, at a certain hour,

on such a day, a boat, manned and armed, is to be sent from the

ship from which the man is sentenced to be punished. On the day

appointed, the signal is made from the admiral, for the fleet to

draw into a line. The hands are then turned up in each ship, and

every officer appears with his cocked hat and sidearms, and the

marines are drawn up in the gangway, with muskets and fixed

bayonets.

"The ship launch to which the delinquent belongs is hoisted out,

and rigged up for the bloody tragedy. In this boat are two

boatswain's mates, with their cats, together with the surgeon and

master-at-arms. The poor creature is now taken out of irons, in

which he has been confined both before and after his sentence,

and brought down from the deck into the boat. The master-at-arms

next desires the mates to tie him up; he is then stripped, and a

blanket thrown over his shoulders. The boats of each ship then

make their painters fast, one ahead of the other, and thus form a

long line of boats. The captain now looks over the gangway, the

master-at-arms reads the infernal sentence, and the quantity of

lashes the victim is to receive at each ship. The captain calls

the boatswain's mate, and says, 'Go on, sir, and do your duty.'

"The blanket is now removed from the shoulders of the poor

fellow, and then commences the fiend-like exhibition. After the

victim has received one dozen, the captain tells the other

boatswain's mate to commence, and after the poor fellow has

received the next dozen the blanket is again thrown over his

shoulders, and the boats tow the launch alongside the next ship,

the drummer and fifer playing the Rogue's March. The same

ceremony is repeated from ship to ship, until the surgeon

pronounces that the man can receive no more without endangering

life; and woe be to the tyrant who dares to inflict one lash more

after the surgeon has spoken. I must here remark that I never

knew an instance of a surgeon in the navy being a tyrant; on the

contrary, both he and his assistants are always respected for

their tender regard for the sick under their care. After this

degrading and cruel punishment the man is again towed to his ship

and helped on board; he is next sent into the sick-bay, his back

anointed in order to heal it, and, in case he has not received

all his punishment, to enable him again to be tortured. When a

man has been flogged round the fleet he is of no further service,

his muscles are contracted, and he is no longer an able man."

Luckily there was no need for impressment to fill the navy, but it was

legal, as it still is.

But most things were rougher and more brutal than nowadays, and

nowhere was it better exemplified than in criminal punishment. Hanging

was the punishment for many offences, but there was such a growing

disinclination on the part of jurors to convict, and so many

recommendations to mercy on the part of judges, that it was about time

to modify our criminal legislature. Something must be done with the

criminals, and they must be punished somehow. It was very certain that

hanging was no deterrent to crime, which was so rampant that the gaols

in England would have been utterly unable to hold the convicts. There

was the alternative of sending them to colonize and be servants in

that vast Australian continent, of which we then knew so little; or

there was the employment of old men-of-war, called "hulks," as

floating prisons, in which the prisoners were confined at night,

working in the daytime on shore, in the dockyards, or elsewhere. These

"hulks" were verily floating hells, but they had the merit over

transportation, of economy, as we may see in a short leader in the

_Times_ of July 19, 1830:--

"Some useful papers have been printed by order of the House of

Commons, exhibiting by a clear and distinct table the difference

of expense attendant on the transport of convicts to New South

Wales, as compared with the cost of their retention and

employment on board of hulks in this country and in Bermuda.

"By a return for the years 1820 to 1829 inclusive, it appears

that, deducting from the gross expense the sums earned by the

labour of the convict, the cost of feeding, clothing, and

maintaining each individual, together with that of the

establishment, and of repairing the hulks, did not, in the course

of last year, exceed £3 17_s._ 4-3/4_d._ per man.

"The expense of transporting convicts to New South Wales presents

a very unfavourable view of that method of treatment, miscalled

punishment, as compared with detention and hard labour on board

the hulks. The official returns of 1828 give, for the charge of

carrying out each male, £26 18_s._ 6_d._; for each female, £34

8_s._ 6-3/4_d._ In 1829, for each male, £25 15_s._ 9-3/4_d._; for

each female, £27 12_s._ 6-1/4_d._"

At that time Australia, Van Dieman's Land, and the Cape of Good Hope,

were so sparsely populated by Europeans, that the introduction of

criminal scum could not very well prejudice anything but the criminal

colonies themselves. Once there, they were irrevocably fixed until

their sentence was expired, and returning before that time was

punishable by death, until August, 1834, when an Act of Parliament was

passed (5 Gul. IV. c. 67) which reduced the penalty to transportation

for life.

But if the vicious and criminal were transported, so occasionally were

the good and innocent, and one case is specially pregnant; it occurs

in a letter in the _Times_ of May 1, 1833--

"Sophia Hallen, a gentlewoman by birth, after having been

detained in prison for several years on an execution obtained in

an action at law by an attorney for the amount of his bill of

costs for £100, was put upon her trial at the Clerkenwell

Sessions on Thursday last, and sentenced to seven years

transportation beyond the seas, for refusing, in effect, to give

up her little property to discharge the debt of this person, who

is her only real creditor; who, it is alleged by her, has acted

improperly in not following the instructions of his client, in

the first instance; in subsequently holding back material

documents, and in rendering a false account in not giving credit

for money he had received, and which have had the effect in

making the defendant, evidently a strong-minded woman,

obstinately refuse to do any act whereby the prosecutor may

obtain payment of his demand."

If we want to know how the system of transportation worked, a glance

through the pages of "The Felonry of New South Wales," by Jas. Mudie,

Lond., 1837, gives us details hardly to be found elsewhere. Talking

about assigning servants, how husbands were assigned to wives, etc.,

and then became practically free, he says--

"To such a pitch has this system arrived, that the streets of

Sydney are, literally, almost as crowded with carriages of every

class as Cheapside, or the Strand, in London; carriages not only

conveying, but being the property of emancipists, and convicts

assigned to their wives.

"A London thief, of any notoriety, after having been a short time

in Sydney, would scorn to place himself or his assignee wife in

so mean a vehicle as a gig; nothing less than a carriage and pair

is commensurate with the rank in felonry to which they have

arisen in Australia.

"A better idea of the effect of all this upon a stranger cannot

be conveyed than by the following anecdote of an officer who

visited New South Wales on leave of absence from his regiment in

India.

"Having gone with a friend in a gig from Sydney to the races at

Paramatta, they were passed on the road by many genteel

equipages, including close carriages, curricles, and landaus.

"In answer to the stranger's questions, his companion informed

him that one brilliant 'set out' belonged to Sam Such-a-one, who

had been a convict, but was now a free man and a man of fortune;

that another was the property of a convict who kept a draper's

shop in Sydney, but was assigned to his wife, who had brought out

with her a large sum of money; that a third belonged to a

ticket-of-leave man, who had obtained that indulgence almost

immediately after his arrival in the colony--and so on.

"At the racecourse, where all the 'beauty and fashion' of

felonry was assembled, the stranger's astonishment was complete

at the number of instances in which he obtained similar answers.

"After some graver reflections on so singular an exhibition, he

ironically remarked that he thought he had better return as soon

as possible to India for the purpose of there committing some

crime that should subject him to a short sentence of

transportation; for it really seemed to him that that was the

best way of getting on in the world!"

His description of the "fine lady convicts" is particularly amusing--

"Things are differently managed now, and when a transport ship

arrives at Sydney, all the madams on board occupy the few days

which elapse before their landing in preparing to produce the

most dazzling effect at their _descent_ upon the Australian

shores.

"With rich silk dresses, bonnets _a la mode_, ear pendants three

inches long, gorgeous shawls and splendid veils, silk stockings,

kid gloves, and parasols in hand, dispensing sweet odours from

their profusely perfumed forms, they disembark, and are assigned

as _servants_ and distributed to the expectant settlers.

"On the very road to their respective places of assignment the

women are told of the easy retirement of the factory, and advised

to get themselves sent there, without having to obtain the

consent of an assignee master.

"Offers of marriage are made to some of them from the waysides;

and at their new habitations they are besieged by suitors.

"The hapless settler who expected a _servant_, able, or, at

least, willing to act perhaps as house and dairymaid, finds he

has received quite a _princess_.

"Her _highness_, with her gloved and delicate fingers, can do

_no_ sort of work!

"Attempts are made to break her in, but in vain. 'If you don't

like me, send me to the factory,' is the common retort; and the

master, having no alternative, takes her before a Bench of

magistrates, by whom she is returned to Government, and conveyed

to the factory accordingly.

"The author, amongst the _favours_ of this kind that have been

conferred upon himself, once received a Dulcinea who, in addition

to her other finery, brought such a cargo of hair, tooth and nail

brushes, Macassar and other hair oils, otto of roses and

botanical creams, cosmetics and scented soaps, that she might

have commenced as a dealer in perfumery. She would have spent

half her time at her toilette, and the rest in playing off the

airs of a fine lady! She was quite indignant at not being allowed

an exclusive dressing-room; and the more so as the _dear_ doctor,

during the passage, had considered her much too delicate to

endure any sort of hardship, and had been so kind and considerate

as to insist upon her using two kinds of tooth brush, lest the

hardness of that first applied should injure the enamel of her

teeth!"

The colonies at last rebelled against having the criminals of England

imported, certainly not to their benefit, and were successful, the

Cape in 1849, and Australia generally in 1864; but a shipment of

convicts was made to West Australia as late as 1867.

Taken altogether, crime, in this reign, was much the same as in any

other, excepting the offences of Burkeing and body-snatching, for the

sake of providing the anatomical schools with subjects--details of

which are too loathsome to read--and the crimes themselves have now no

existence.

[Illustration: Decoration.]

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

A Ballade of the Scottyshe King.

Chap Books of the Eighteenth Century.

Social Life in the Reign of Queen Anne.

The Adventures of Captain John Smith.

Humour, Wit, and Satire of the Seventeenth Century.

English Caricature and Satire on Napoleon First.

Old Times.

The Dawn of the Nineteenth Century.

The Voiage and Travayle of Sir John Maundeville.

A Century of Ballads.

The Fleet, its River, Prison, and Marriages.

The Legendary History of the Cross.

Men, Maidens, and Manners a Hundred Years Ago.

Romances of Chivalry.

Modern Street Ballads.

Curious Creatures in Zoology.

Social England under the Regency.

Eighteenth Century Waifs.

Drinks of the World.

The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood.

Charles Letts's Date Book and Chronological Diary.

Lord Mayor's Show in the Olden Time.

Real Sailor Songs.

"Varia."

History of the Lottery in England.

Cassell's Social Life in England (_partly_).

A Righte Merrie Christmasse!

Hyde Park from Domesday Book to Date.

When William IV. was King.

PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.

[Transcriber's note: Obvious printer's errors have been corrected, all

other inconsistencies are as in the original. The author's spelling

has been maintained.]

End of Project Gutenberg's When William IV. Was King, by John Ashton