Old and New London Part 58

"The king was as much amazed as the princess had been amused; and a well-inspired wag of the Court whispered an a.s.surance which increased his perplexity. It was to the effect that the angry lady was only a mock Lady Mayoress, whom the unmarried Mayor had hired for the occasion, borrowing her for that day only. The a.s.surance was credited for a time, till persons more discreet than the wag convinced the Court party that Lady Humphreys was really no counterfeit. She was no beauty either; and the same party, when they withdrew from the festive scene, were all of one mind, that she must needs be what she seemed, for if the Lord Mayor had been under the necessity of borrowing, he would have borrowed altogether another sort of woman." This is one of the earliest stories connecting the City with an idea of vulgarity and purse pride. The stories commenced with the Court Tories, when the City began to resist Court oppression.

A leap now takes us on in the City chronicles. In 1727 (the year George I. died), the Royal Family, the Ministry, besides n.o.bles and foreign ministers, were entertained by Sir Edward Becher, mayor (Draper). George II. ordered the sum of 1,000 to be paid to the sheriffs for the relief of insolvent debtors. The feast cost 4,890. In 1733 (George II.), John Barber--Swift, Pope, and Bolingbroke's friend--the Jacobite printer who defeated a scheme of a general excise, was mayor. Barber erected the monument to Butler, the poet, in Westminster Abbey, who, by the way, had written a very sarcastic "Character of an Alderman." Barber's epitaph on the poet's monument is in high-flown Latin, which drew from Samuel Wesley these lines:--

"While Butler, needy wretch! was yet alive, No generous patron would a dinner give.

See him, when starved to death, and turned to dust, Presented with a monumental bust.

The poet's fate is here in emblem shown-- He asked for bread, and he received a stone."

In 1739 (George II.) Sir Micajah Perry (Haberdasher) laid the first stone of the Mansion House. Sir Samuel Pennant (mayor in 1750), kinsman of the London historian, died of gaol fever, caught at Newgate, and which at the same time carried off an alderman, two judges, and some disregarded commonalty. The great bell of St. Paul's tolled on the death of the Lord Mayor, according to custom. Sir Christopher Gascoigne (1753), an ancestor of the present Viscount Cranbourne, was the first Lord Mayor who resided at the Mansion House.

In that memorable year (1761) when Sir Samuel Fludyer was elected, King George III. and Queen Charlotte (the young couple newly crowned) came to the City to see the Lord Mayor's Show from Mr. Barclay's window, as we have already described in our account of Cheapside; and the ancient pageant was so far revived that the Fishmongers ventured on a St. Peter, a dolphin, and two mermaids, and the Skinners on Indian princes dressed in furs. Sir Samuel Fludyer was a Cloth Hall factor, and the City's scandalous chronicle says that he originally came up to London attending clothier's pack-horses, from the west country; his second wife was granddaughter of a n.o.bleman, and niece of the Earl of Cardigan. His sons married into the Montagu and Westmoreland families, and his descendants are connected with the Earls Onslow and Brownlow; and he was very kind to young Romilly, his kinsman (afterwards the excellent Sir Samuel). The "City Biography" says Fludyer died from vexation at a reprimand given him by the Lord Chancellor, for having carried on a contraband trade in scarlet cloth, to the prejudice of the East India Company. Sir Samuel was the ground landlord of Fludyer Street, Westminster, cleared away for the new Foreign Office.

In 1762 and again in 1769 that bold citizen, William Beckford, a friend of the great Chatham, was Lord Mayor. He was descended from a Maidenhead tailor, one of whose sons made a fortune in Jamaica. At Westminster School he had acquired the friendship of Lord Mansfield and a rich earl.

Beckford united in himself the following apparently incongruous characters. He was an enormously rich Jamaica planter, a merchant, a member of Parliament, a militia officer, a provincial magistrate, a London alderman, a man of pleasure, a man of taste, an orator, and a country gentleman. He opposed Government on all occasions, especially in bringing over Hessian troops, and in carrying on a German war. His great dictum was that under the House of Hanover Englishmen for the first time had been able to be free, and for the first time had determined to be free. He presented to the king a remonstrance against a false return made at the Middles.e.x election. The king expressed dissatisfaction at the remonstrance, but Beckford presented another, and to the astonishment of the Court, added the following impromptu speech:--

"Permit me, sire, to observe," are said to have been the concluding remarks of the insolent citizen, "that whoever has already dared, or shall hereafter endeavour by false insinuations and suggestions to alienate your Majesty's affections from your loyal subjects in general, and from the City of London in particular, and to withdraw your confidence in, and regard for, your people, is an enemy to your Majesty's person and family, a violator of the public peace, and a betrayer of our happy const.i.tution as it was established at the _Glorious and Necessary Revolution_." At these words the king's countenance was observed to flush with anger. He still, however, presented a dignified silence; and accordingly the citizens, after having been permitted to kiss the king's hand, were forced to return dissatisfied from the presence-chamber.

This speech, which won Lord Chatham's "admiration, thanks, and affection," and was inscribed on the pedestal of Beckford's statue erected in Guildhall, has been the subject of bitter disputes. Isaac Reed boldly a.s.serts every word was written by Horne Tooke, and that Horne Tooke himself said so. Gifford, with his usual headlong partisanship, says the same; but there is every reason to suppose that the words are those uttered by Beckford with but one slight alteration.

Beckford died, a short time after making this speech, of a fever, caught by riding from London to Fonthill, his Wiltshire estate. His son, the novelist and voluptuary, had a long minority, and succeeded at last to a million ready money and 100,000 a year, only to end life a solitary, despised, exiled man. One of his daughters married the Duke of Hamilton.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A LORD MAYOR AND HIS LADY (MIDDLE OF SEVENTEENTH CENTURY). _From an Old Print._]

The Right Hon. Thomas Harley, Lord Mayor in 1768, was a brother of the Earl of Oxford. He turned wine-merchant, and married the daughter of his father's steward, according to the scandalous chronicles in the "City Biography." He is said, in partnership with Mr. Drummond, to have made 600,000 by taking a Government contract to pay the English army in America with foreign gold. He was for many years "the father of the City."

Harley first rendered himself famous in the City by seizing the boot and petticoat which the mob were burning opposite the Mansion House, in derision of Lord Bute and the princess-dowager, at the time the sheriffs were burning the celebrated _North Briton_. The mob were throwing the papers about as matter of diversion, and one of the bundles fell, unfortunately, with considerable force, against the front gla.s.s of Mr.

Sheriff Harley's chariot, which it shattered to pieces. This gave the first alarm; the sheriffs retired into the Mansion House, and a man was taken up and brought there for examination, as a person concerned in the riot. The man appeared to be a mere idle spectator; but the Lord Mayor informed the court that, in order to try the temper of the mob, he had ordered one of his own servants to be dressed in the clothes of the supposed offender, and conveyed to the Poultry Compter, so that if a rescue should be effected, the prisoner would still be in custody, and the real disposition of the people discovered. However, everything was peaceable, and the course of justice was not interrupted, nor did any insult accompany the commitment; whereupon the prisoner was discharged.

What followed, in the actual burning of the seditious paper, the Lord Mayor declared (according to the best information), arose from circ.u.mstances equally foreign to any illegal or violent designs. For these reasons his lordship concluded by declaring that, with the greatest respect for the sheriffs, and a firm belief that they would have done their duty in spite of any danger, he should put a negative upon giving the thanks of the City upon a matter that was not sufficiently important for a public and solemn acknowledgment, which ought only to follow the most eminent exertions of duty.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WILKES ON HIS TRIAL. (_From a Contemporary Print._)]

In 1770 Bra.s.s Crosby (mayor) signalised himself by a patriotic resistance to Court oppression, and the arbitrary proceedings of the House of Commons. He was a Sunderland solicitor, who had married his employer's widow, and settled in London. He married in all three wives, and is said to have received 200,000 by the three. Shortly after Crosby's election, the House of Commons issued warrants against the printers of the _Middles.e.x Journal_ and the _Gazetteer_, for presuming to give reports of the debates; but on being brought before Alderman Wilkes, he discharged them. The House then proceeded against the printer of the _Evening Post_, but Crosby discharged him, and committed the messenger of the House for a.s.sault and false imprisonment. Not long after, Crosby appeared at the bar of the House, and defended what he had done; pleading strongly that by an Act of William and Mary no warrant could be executed in the City but by its ministers. Wilkes also had received an order to attend at the bar of the House, but refused to comply with it, on the ground that no notice had been taken in the order of his being a member. The next day the Lord Mayor's clerk attended with the Book of Recognisances, and Lord North having carried a motion that the recognisance be erased, the clerk was compelled to cancel it. Most of the Opposition indignantly rose and left the House, declaring that effacing a record was an act of the greatest despotism; and Junius, in Letter 44, wrote: "By mere violence, and without the shadow of right, they have expunged the record of a judicial proceeding." Soon after this act, on the motion of Welbore Ellis, the mayor was committed to the Tower. The people were furious; Lord North lost his c.o.c.ked hat, and even Fox had his clothes torn; and the mob obtaining a rope, but for Crosby's entreaties, would have hung the Deputy Sergeant-at-Arms. The question was simply whether the House had the right to despotically arrest and imprison, and to supersede trial by jury. On the 8th of May the session terminated, and the Lord Mayor was released. The City was illuminated at night, and there were great rejoicings. The victory was finally won.

"The great end of the contest," says Mr. Orridge, "was obtained. From that day to the present the House of Commons has never ventured to a.s.sail the liberty of the press, or to prevent the publication of the Parliamentary debates."

At his inauguration dinner in Guildhall, there was a superabundance of good things; notwithstanding which, a great number of young fellows, after the dinner was over, being heated with liquor, got upon the hustings, and broke all the bottles and gla.s.ses within their reach. At this time the Court and Ministry were out of favour in the City; and till the year 1776, when Halifax took as the legend of his mayoralty "Justice is the ornament and protection of liberty," no member of the Government received an invitation to dine at Guildhall.

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

THE LORD MAYORS OF LONDON (_continued_).

John Wilkes: his Birth and Parentage--The _North Briton_--Duel with Martin--His Expulsion--Personal Appearance--Anecdotes of Wilkes--A Reason for making a Speech--Wilkes and the King--The Lord Mayor at the Gordon Riots--"Soap-suds" _versus_ "Bar"--Sir William Curtis and his Kilt--A Gambling Lord Mayor--Sir William Staines, Bricklayer and Lord Mayor--"Patty-pan" Birch--Sir Matthew Wood--Waithman--Sir Peter Laurie and the "Dregs of the People"--Recent Lord Mayors.

In 1774 that clever rascal, John Wilkes, ascended the civic throne. We shall so often meet this unscrupulous demagogue about London, that we will not dwell upon him here at much length. Wilkes was born in Clerkenwell, 1727. His father, Israel Wilkes, was a rich distiller (as his father and grandfather had been), who kept a coach and six, and whose house was a resort of persons of rank, merchants, and men of letters. Young Wilkes grew up a man of pleasure, squandered his wife's fortune in gambling and other fashionable vices, and became a notorious member of the h.e.l.l Fire Club at Medmenham Abbey. He now eagerly strove for place, asking Mr. Pitt to find him a post in the Board of Trade, or to send him as amba.s.sador to Constantinople. Finding his efforts useless, he boldly avowed his intention of becoming notorious by a.s.sailing Government. In 1763, in his scurrilous paper, the _North Britain_, he violently abused the Princess Dowager and her favourite Lord Bute, who were supposed to influence the young king, and in the celebrated No. 45 he accused the ministers of putting a lie in the king's mouth. The Government illegally arresting him by an arbitrary "general warrant," he was committed to the Tower, and at once became the martyr of the people and the idol of the City. Released by Chief-Justice Pratt, he was next proceeded against for an obscene poem, the "Essay on Woman." He fought a duel with Samuel Martin, a brother M.P., who had insulted him, and was expelled the House in 1764. He then went to France in the height of his popularity, having just obtained a verdict in his favour upon the question of the warrant. On his return to England, he daringly stood for the representation of London, and was elected for Middles.e.x. Riots took place, a man was shot by the soldiers, and Wilkes was committed to the King's Bench prison. After a long contest with the Commons, Wilkes was expelled the House, and being re-elected for Middles.e.x, the election was declared void.

Eventually Wilkes became Chamberlain of the City, lectured refractory apprentices like a father, and tamed down to an ordinary man of the world, still shameless, ribald, irreligious, but, as Gibbon says, "a good companion with inexhaustible spirits, infinite wit and humour, and a great deal of knowledge." He quietly took his seat for Middles.e.x in 1782, and eight years afterwards the resolutions against him were erased from the Journals of the House. He died in 1797, at his house in Grosvenor Square. Wilkes' sallow face, sardonic squint, and projecting jaw, are familiar to us from Hogarth's terrible caricature. He generally wore the dress of a colonel of the militia--scarlet and buff, with a c.o.c.ked hat and rosette, bag wig, and military boots, and O'Keefe describes seeing him walking in from his house at Kensington Gore, disdaining all offers of a coach. Dr. Franklin, when in England, describes the mob stopping carriages, and compelling their inmates to shout "Wilkes and liberty!" For the first fifteen miles out of London on the Winchester road, he says, and on nearly every door or window-shutter, "No. 45" was chalked. By many Tory writers Wilkes is considered latterly to have turned his coat, but he seems to us to have been perfectly consistent to the end. He was always a Whig with aristocratic tastes. When oppression ceased he ceased to protest. Most men grow more Conservative as their minds weaken, but Wilkes was always resolute for liberty.

A few anecdotes of Wilkes are necessary for seasoning to our chapter.

Horne Tooke having challenged Wilkes, who was then sheriff of London and Middles.e.x, received the following laconic reply: "Sir, I do not think it my business to cut the throat of every desperado that may be tired of his life; but as I am at present High Sheriff of the City of London, it may shortly happen that I shall have an opportunity of attending you in my civil capacity, in which case I will answer for it that _you shall have no ground_ to complain of my endeavours to serve you." This is one of the bitterest retorts ever uttered. Wilkes's notoriety led to his head being painted as a public-house sign, which, however, did not invariably raise the original in estimation. An old lady, in pa.s.sing a public-house distinguished as above, her companion called her attention to the sign. "Ah!" replied she, "Wilkes swings everywhere but where he ought." Wilkes's squint was proverbial; yet even this natural obliquity he turned to humorous account. When Wilkes challenged Lord Townshend, he said, "Your lordship is one of the handsomest men in the kingdom, and I am one of the ugliest. Yet, give me but half an hour's start, and I will enter the lists against you with any woman you choose to name."

Once, when the house seemed resolved not to hear him, and a friend urged him to desist--"Speak," he said, "I must, for my speech has been in print for the newspapers this half-hour." Fortunately for him, he was gifted with a coolness and effrontery which were only equalled by his intrepidity, all three of which qualities constantly served his turn in the hour of need. As an instance of his audacity, it may be stated that on one occasion he and another person put forth, from a private room in a tavern, a proclamation commencing--"We, the people of England," &c., and concluding--"By order of the meeting." Another amusing instance of his effrontery occurred on the hustings at Brentford, when he and Colonel Luttrell were standing there together as rival candidates for the representation of Middles.e.x in Parliament. Looking down with great apparent apathy on the sea of human beings, consisting chiefly of his own votaries and friends, which stretched beneath him--"I wonder," he whispered to his opponent, "whether among that crowd the fools or the knaves predominate?" "I will tell them what you say," replied the astonished Luttrell, "and thus put an end to you." Perceiving that Wilkes treated the threat with the most perfect indifference--"Surely,"

he added, "you don't mean to say you could stand here one hour after I did so?" "Why not?" replied Wilkes; "it is _you_ who would not be alive one instant after." "How so?" inquired Luttrell. "Because," said Wilkes, "I should merely affirm that it was a fabrication, and they would destroy you in the twinkling of an eye."

During his latter days Wilkes not only became a courtier, but was a frequent attendant at the levees of George III. On one of these occasions the King happened to inquire after his old friend "Sergeant Glynn," who had been Wilkes's counsel during his former seditious proceedings. "_My friend_, sir!" replied Wilkes; "he is no friend of mine; he was a Wilkite, sir, which I never was."

He once dined with George IV. when Prince of Wales, when overhearing the Prince speak in rather disparaging language of his father, with whom he was then notoriously on bad terms, he seized an opportunity of proposing the health of the King. "Why, Wilkes," said the Prince, "how long is it since you became so loyal?" "Ever since, sir," was the reply, "I had the honour of becoming acquainted with your Royal Highness."

Alderman Sawbridge (Framework Knitter), mayor in 1775, on his return from a state visit to Kew with all his retinue, was stopped and stripped by a single highwayman. The swordbearer did not even attempt to hew down the robber.

In 1780, Alderman Kennet (Vintner) was mayor during the Gordon riots. He had been a waiter and then a wine merchant, was a coa.r.s.e and ignorant man, and displayed great incompetence during the week the rioters literally held London. When he was summoned to the House, to be examined about the riots, one of the members observed, "If you ring the bell, Kennet will come in, of course." On being asked why he did not at the outset send for the _posse comitatus_, he replied he did not know where the fellow lived, or else he would. One evening at the Alderman's Club, he was sitting at whist, next Mr. Alderman Pugh, a soap-boiler. "Ring the bell, Soap-suds," said Kennet. "Ring it yourself, Bar," replied Pugh; "you have been twice as much used to it as I have." There is no disgrace in having been a soap-boiler or a wine merchant; the true disgrace is to be ashamed of having carried on an honest business.

Alderman Clarke (Joiner), mayor in 1784, succeeded Wilkes as Chamberlain in 1798, and died aged ninety-two, in 1831. This City patriarch was, when a mere boy, introduced to Dr. Johnson by that insufferable man, Sir John Hawkins. He met Dr. Percy, Goldsmith, and Hawkesworth, with the Polyphemus of letters, at the "Mitre." He was a member of the Ess.e.x Head Club. "When he was sheriff in 1777," says Mr. Timbs, "he took Dr.

Johnson to a judges' dinner at the Old Bailey, the judges being Blackstone and Eyre." The portrait of Chamberlain Clarke, in the Court of Common Council in Guildhall, is by Sir Thomas Lawrence, and cost one hundred guineas. There is also a bust of Mr. Clarke, by Sievier, at the Guildhall, which was paid for by a subscription of the City officers.

Alderman Boydell, mayor in 1790, we have described fully elsewhere. He presided over Cheap Ward for twenty-three years. Nearly opposite his house, 90, Cheapside, is No. 73, which, before the present Mansion House was built, was used occasionally as the Lord Mayor's residence.

Sir James Saunderson (Draper), from whose curious book of official expenses we quote in our chapter on the Mansion House, was mayor in 1792. It was this mayor who sent a posse of officers to disperse a radical meeting held at that "caldron of sedition," Founders' Hall, and among the persons expelled was a young orator named Waithman, afterwards himself a mayor.

1795-6 was made pleasant to the Londoners by the abounding hospitality of Sir William Curtis, a portly baronet, who, while he delighted in a liberal feast and a cheerful gla.s.s, evidently thought them of small value unless shared by his friends. Many years afterwards, during the reign of George IV., whose good graces he had secured, he went to Scotland with the king, and made Edinburgh merry by wearing a kilt in public. The wits laughed at his costume, complete even to the little dagger in the stocking, but told him he had forgotten one important thing--the spoon.

In 1797, Sir Benjamin Hamet was fined 1,000 for refusing to serve as mayor.

1799. Alderman Combe, mayor, the brewer, whom some saucy citizens nicknamed "Mash-tub." But he loved gay company. Among the members at Brookes's who indulged in high play was Combe, who is said to have made as much money in this way as he did by brewing. One evening, whilst he filled the office of Lord Mayor, he was busy at a full hazard table at Brookes's, where the wit and dice-box circulated together with great glee, and where Beau Brummel was one of the party. "Come, Mash-tub,"

said Brummel, who was the _caster_, "what do you _set_?" "Twenty-five guineas," answered the alderman. "Well, then," returned the beau, "have at the mare's pony" (twenty-five guineas). The beau continued to throw until he drove home the brewer's twelve ponies running, and then getting up and making him a low bow whilst pocketing the cash, he said, "Thank you, alderman; for the future I shall never drink any porter but yours."

"I wish, sir," replied the brewer, "that every other blackguard in London would tell me the same." Combe was succeeded in the mayoralty by Sir William Staines. They were both smokers, and were seen one night at the Mansion House lighting their pipes at the same taper; which reminds us of the two kings of Brentford smelling at one nosegay. (Timbs.)

1800. Sir William Staines, mayor. He began life as a bricklayer's labourer, and by persevering steadily in the pursuit of one object, acc.u.mulated a large fortune, and rose to the state coach and the Mansion House. He was Alderman of Cripplegate Ward, where his memory is much respected. In Jacob's Well Pa.s.sage, in 1786, he built nine houses for the reception of his aged and indigent friends. They are erected on both sides of the court, with nothing to distinguish them from the other dwelling-houses, and without ostentatious display of stone or other inscription to denote the poverty of the inhabitants. The early tenants were aged workmen, tradesmen, &c., several of whom Staines had personally esteemed as his neighbours. One, a peruke-maker, had shaved the worthy alderman during forty years. Staines also built Barbican Chapel, and rebuilt the "Jacob's Well" public-house, noted for dramatic representations. The alderman was an illiterate man, and was a sort of b.u.t.t amongst his brethren. At one of the Old Bailey dinners, after a sumptuous repast of turtle and venison, Sir William was eating a great quant.i.ty of b.u.t.ter with his cheese. "Why, brother," said Wilkes, "you lay it on with a _trowel_!" A son of Sir William Staines, who worked at his father's business (a builder), fell from a lofty ladder, and was killed; when the father, on being fetched to the spot, broke through the crowd, exclaiming, "See that the poor fellow's watch is safe!" His manners may be judged from the following anecdote. At a City feast, when sheriff, sitting by General Tarleton, he thus addressed him, "Eat away at the pines, General; for we must pay, eat or not eat."

In 1806, Sir James Shaw (Scrivener), afterwards Chamberlain, was a native of Kilmarnock, where a marble statue of him has been erected. He was of the humblest birth, but ama.s.sed a fortune as a merchant, and sat in three parliaments for the City. He was extremely charitable, and was one of the first to a.s.sist the children of Burns. At one of his mayoralty dinners, seven sons of George III. were guests.

Sir William Domville (Stationer), mayor in 1814, gave the great Guildhall banquet to the Prince Regent and the Allied Sovereigns during the short and fallacious peace before Waterloo. The dinner was served on plate valued at 200,000, and the entire entertainment cost nearly 25,000. The mayor was made baronet for this.

In 1815 reigned Alderman Birch, the celebrated Cornhill confectioner.

The business at No. 15, Cornhill was established by Mr. Horton, in the reign of George I. Samuel Birch, born in 1787, was for many years a member of the Common Council, a City orator, an Alderman of the Ward of Candlewick, a poet, a dramatic writer, and Colonel of the City Militia.

His pastry was, after all, the best thing he did, though he laid the first stone of the London Inst.i.tution, and wrote the inscription to Chantrey's statue of George III., now in the Council Chamber, Guildhall.

"Mr. Patty-pan" was Birch's nickname.

Theodore Hook, or some clever versifier of the day, wrote an amusing skit on the vain, fussy, good-natured Jack-of-all-trades, beginning--

"Monsieur grown tired of frica.s.see, Resolved Old England now to see, The country where their roasted beef And puddings large pa.s.s all belief."

Wherever this inquisitive foreigner goes he find Monsieur Birch--

"Guildhall at length in sight appears, An orator is hailed with cheers.

'Zat orator, vat is hees name?'

'Birch the pastrycook--the very same.'"