London (England) -- Description and travel; London (England) -- History -- 1800-1950
We append a specimen of a short
one:
’Now, the Lambeth folks this wealthy gent
As their member did decide on,
But little they knew he’d happened to do
Some things he didn’t oughter;
For he’d forged a will and several deeds....
’And the public said: "Well, this here Roupell
Has got no more than he oughter."
So there was an end of the wealthy gent
As was member from over the water.’
Lambeth appears to have been unfortunate in the selection of its
Parliamentary candidates. In 1852 the parochial party, wishing for a
local man, formed themselves into a committee to secure the election of
Mr. Joseph Harvey, of Lambeth House, a drapery establishment in the
Westminster Bridge Road. Mr. Harvey had never taken an active part in
public matters; his tastes lay not that way. He shrank from public
life, and had no training or aptitude for addressing large meetings.
However, he was forced forward; but when he spoke at the Horns—the
speech was written for him by someone else—his total incapacity for the
position thrust on him became so apparent that he gave up the contest,
but not before he had afforded plenty of food to the squib-writers.
Parliament is not above the use of nicknames, either by way of praise or
in scorn. Cobbett’s talent for fastening such names on anyone he
disliked was very great. He invented ’Prosperity Robinson,’ ’Æolus
Canning,’ ’Pink-nosed Liverpool,’ ’unbaptized, buttonless blackguards,’
or Quakers. Lord Yarmouth, from the colour of his whiskers, and from
the place which gave him his title, was known as ’Red Herrings.’ Lord
Durham so often opposed his colleagues in the Cabinet that he was called
the ’Dissenting Minister.’ Thomas Duncombe was so popular that he was
always spoken of as ’Honest’ or ’Poor’ Tom; his French friends called
him ’Cher Tomie.’ John Arthur Roebuck had a habit of bringing forward,
in a startling way, facts he had got hold of, and thus raising
opposition; and from a passage in a speech he made at the Cutlers’
Feast, at Sheffield, in 1858, obtained the nickname of ’Tear ’em.’ He
had just paid a visit to Cherbourg, and returned home with feelings very
unfriendly to the then ruler of France, to which he gave expression at
the feast, excusing himself at the same time for using such language
towards a neighbour by saying: ’The farmer who goes to sleep, having
placed the watch-dog, Tear ’em, over his rick-yard, hears that dog bark.
He bawls out of the window: "Down, Tear ’em, down!" And Tear ’em does
not again disturb his sleep, till he is woke up by the strong blaze of
his corn and hay ricks. I am Tear ’em. Beware! Cherbourg is a
standing menace to England.’ Michael Angelo Taylor was known by the
sobriquet of ’Chicken’ Taylor. On some points of law he had answered
the great lawyer Bearcroft, but not without apologizing for his
venturing, he being but a chicken in the law, on a fight with the cock
of Westminster Hall.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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