Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 101, Jubilee Issue, July 18, 1891 — John Shaqi
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 101, Jubilee Issue, July 18, 1891Various
General
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 101, Jubilee Issue, July 18, 1891
Various
English wit and humor -- Periodicals
On the Front Bench opposite was Sir ROBERT PEEL with JAMES GRAHAM at
his right elbow. In modest retirement at the end of the Bench sat a
young man, of full height, and good figure, with a mass of black hair
crowning a large, well-shaped head. Remember noticing how carefully
the hair was parted down the middle, in a fashion then unusual with
men. His face was pleasant to look upon, even mild in its expression;
but from time to time, more particularly when he spoke, there
flashed from beneath his dark and bushy eyebrows a pair of eyes that
shone like stars. This was the Mr. G. of those days, whose highest
Ministerial office, as yet, had been the Under-Secretaryship for the
Colonies, held for a few months six years earlier.
[Illustration: "W.E.G.," 1860.]
Big House on this first night, as Houses were counted then, when the
number of Members was considerably less. First business was to choose
SPEAKER. SHAW-LEFEVRE (not the Member for Bradford, but a forbear)
had been SPEAKER in last Parliament; re-elected now, PEEL, who, by
the lifting of a finger, could have put his own nominee in the Chair,
graciously consenting.
[Illustration: "The Colossus of Words," 1879.]
Of all who filled the House on that night, only two have seats in
the present Parliament--Mr. G., and the humble person who, by favour
of the Electors of Barkshire, is permitted to pen these lines.
(CHRISTOPHER TALBOT, then represented Glamorganshire, but he just
failed to live into this Jubilee time.) Yet, when I look round on the
Benches now, I see a score of men who bear the names, and are, in many
cases, descendants, of Members who sat in the Parliament that will
ever have a place in history, if only because it was born in the same
year, almost in the same month, as _Mr. Punch_. There was a THOMAS
DYKE ACLAND, representing Devonshire; there were two HENEAGES, one
representing Devizes, and the other, EDWARD, sitting for Grimsby,
as EDWARD HENEAGE sits to-day for the same borough. There was a
BORTHWICK, Member for Evesham. There was a PHILIP STANHOPE, Member for
Hertford. STANSFELD sat for Huddersfield, and MARJORIBANKS for Hythe,
a LAWSON for Knaresborough, a BECKETT for Leeds, a CHILDERS for
Malton, a MANNERS for Newark-upon-Trent, having a certain WILLIAM
EWART GLADSTONE for colleague. He was the Lord JOHN, well known to
students of poetry, who now wears a Ducal coronet.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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