Liverpool a few years since: by an old stagerAspinall, James
History
Liverpool a few years since: by an old stager
Aspinall, James
Liverpool (England) -- Biography; Liverpool (England) -- History
After him, we had a hero of another cut, figure, and
appearance, General Fisher, whom it was glorious to behold. We will
attempt to describe him. It was his custom to creep up Duke Street,
where he was quartered, every morning before breakfast. He used to have
on a pair of long, light blue pantaloons; slippers, down at the heels; a
seedy coat, dear at three-halfpence for a scare-crow; a cocked hat to
match, with much more grease than nap on it—we all hated Nap in those
days—and a little feather, about two inches high, just peeping above it.
And then the figure of fun arrayed in these habiliments. The general was
a stout man, with rather a protuberant corporation. His cheeks bore the
marks, it may be of many campaigns, but certainly of many vintages. He
blushed port wine unceasingly. His nose, no small one, grew into
something like a large bulbous root towards the extremity; and he wore a
pig-tail, huge in its dimensions, both as to length, breadth, and
thickness, even in those days of pig-tails. Such was the one-time
champion of this district, as he might be seen creeping every morning
through the streets, with his hands in his pantaloon pockets, not unlike
an old pantaloon himself, and with a crowd of little boys admiring the
war-like apparition, but strongly doubting whether it was St. George or
the Dragon that stood before them.
CHAPTER V.
We spoke, in our last chapter, of the false alarms by which the soldiers
forming our garrison were once or twice called together in the night, to
try their zeal and alacrity; and we said how terribly alarmed were the
women and children on such occasions. But we can, as truly as proudly,
add that their fears did not extend to our brave and gallant volunteers.
They rushed to their gathering spots, wild and eager for the coming
danger, and, we verily believe, were sorely disappointed when they found
that the actual opportunity had not arrived for teaching the enemy how
Englishmen could fight for their country, their king, their altars,
hearths, and homes. Let us, however, be thankful that we were never
subjected to the horrors of invasion, but that the bold front of our
champions kept it and them at a distance. The worst of our military
fever was, that, in imitation of the bad practice of real soldiers at
that day, it led to several duels. One of them ended fatally, a member
of one of the most respectable families in the town having fallen by the
hand of another, with whom he had always previously been on the most
intimate terms. It was supposed at the time that this sad affair was
encouraged by some who should have made every exertion and used every
effort to have prevented it, but did not.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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