Bygones Worth Remembering, Vol. 1 (of 2)Holyoake, George Jacob
Philosophy
Bygones Worth Remembering, Vol. 1 (of 2)
Holyoake, George Jacob
Holyoake, George Jacob, 1817-1906; Social reformers -- Great Britain -- Biography; Working class -- Great Britain -- Biography
Regularity and decency of conduct are peculiarly required on board ship.
It is the duty of those in command to repress, by the most decided
and summary measures, any tendency to insubordination, to check every
species of immorality and vice, and to discountenance to the utmost of
their power whatever may disturb the comfort of others, or interrupt the
harmony and good understanding which should subsist on board.
We had trouble in London. One day at a Committee, held at my house, an
applicant, who was contracting to supply 900 rifles, attended to show
certificates of their efficiency. The legal eye of the chairman (Mr.
Craufurd, M.P., one of the prosecuting counsel of the Mint), detected
them to be forgeries. On his saying so, the applicant snatched them from
his hand. The chairman at once seized the knave, when a struggle
ensued to obtain the false credentials. As it was not prudent in us to
prosecute the presenter and have our proceedings before a court, we let
him go.
There being no legal power to enforce order was the cardinal weakness
of the British Legion. A competent commander should at least have been
appointed, and an agreement of honour entered into by each volunteer, to
obey his authority and that of those under him, on penalty of dismissal,
and a certain forfeiture of money. These conditions, though not of
legal force, would be binding on men of honour, and place the turbulent
without honour at a disadvantage.
At the Queenwood community, in Robert Owen's day, no contract of this
kind was thought of, and any one who declined to leave could defy
the governor, until he was ejected by force--a process which did not
harmonise with "Harmony Hall."
De Rohan met the Excursionists at Palermo on their disembarkation.
"Captain Styles" was prudently absent, and no more was heard of him. The
spurious commissions could not be recognised, and commotion naturally
arose among those who had been defrauded. Captain Sarsfield, Colonel
Peard, known as "Garibaldi's Englishman," De Rohan, Captain Scott,
and others on the spot, with colourable pretensions to authority, took
different views of the situation. Appeals were made to the Committee in
London, on whose minutes stormy telegrams are recorded. Mr. Craufurd,
though he had the prudent reticence of his race, would sometimes fall
into impetuous expressions. Yet the second statement of his first
thought would be faultless. This quality was so conspicuous that it
interested me.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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