DOI Heft:
November 30, 1867
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16880#0234
November 30, 1867.j
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
223
—CV,
FREEDOM IN FRANCE.
he other day, some per-
sons having met together
peaceably in the cemetery
of Montmartre, were
pounced upon by the police
and carried off to_ prison,
on the charge of having
formed a treasonable as-
sembly. The liberal French
journals, having ventured
to demur to the legality
of the arrest, have been
Hooded with a deluge of
“communiques” from Go-
vernment, and ere long
doubtless will be “warned,”
in future, to abstain from
criticising the police. In
France it is an axiom that
policemen are infallible, like
Popes, and can never be
mistaken in making an
arrest. We think, however,
that the question What is
an assembly ? should be le-
gally debated, that French-
men may know, with some
degree of accuracy, what
number of persons are held by law to constitute a treasonable meeting :
and some notion should be given of the proofs by which the Govern-
ment can now convince its law courts that, when a score or two of
people have chanced to come together, their meeting is intended for a
treasonable end.
The French Government at present seems so much to fear a crowd,
that we really almost wonder that the theatres are suffered to perform
attractive pieces, lest by doing so they happen to obtain a crowded
house. We are surprised, too, that French playgoers are not by law
forbidden to assemble in the street, before the opening of the doors.
Conspirators might readily arrange to meet together, and staud quietly
en queue until the time came for admission, and thus it would be easy
for them all to sit together, and hold traitorous assemblies in the
gallery or pit.
For the benefit of strangers, the word “assembly” should be clearly
and legally defined; else some day we may hear that Mb. Smith has
been arrested for happening to join an assembly in an omnibus, or that
unhappy Mb. Jones has been clapped in a French prison, because,
while stopping for a moment to stare at a shop window, he chanced to
be surrounded by some half-a-dozen persons, who stopped to do the
same. Any pressure in a crowd just now is perilous in Paris, for in
the streets as in the newspapers, the Government sets its face against
the freedom of the press.
AMONGST THE MASSES.
Special Commissioners accredited from the Court of St. Punch—it
may interest, but cannot surprise Everybody, to hear that the compe-
tition for these posts of honour was of the keenest, not to say of the
savagest intensity, especially when it became known that the remune-
ration was twice as much as Revising Barristers and Boundary
Commissioners are awarded by a penurious Government—have been
engaged during the Parliamentary recess in ascertaining by a personal
and daily inquiry, with an interval allowed for luncheon, how far the
various tribes of the people who, under the new Reform Bill will
acquire votes, are educating and fitting themselves for the proper
discharge of their important function, with or without the aid of stimu-
lants and. local solicitors, at the next General Election, and in what
light, lurid or sunny, they regard the responsibility of the Franchise.
A few of the cases cited in the Commissioners’ voluminous reports
(accompanied by Maps, Plans, Appendixes and Evidence,) written
after dinner in the leading London Restaurants and best provincial
Hotels, on foolscap half-margin, slightly smelling of smoke, and deli-
vered by Queen’s Messengers at all hours of the night at our Bureau,
may be useful reading for the Legislature now in November assembled,
and all orders and degrees of men—and with both eyes to the possibi-
lities ol the future—women amongst us.
It will be observed that the S. C. have, in most instances, given the
sentiments rather than the exact language of the representative men
whom they interrogated.
William Moakes, costermonger. Education imperfect in youth.
Finding that the Reform Bill would give him a voice, rather a hoarse
one he admits, iu the representation of Hoxton, began from the very
day the measure became law regularly to attend an Adult Night School,
that he might be able to peruse the bills on the walls in different
colours, explaining the different political opinions of the different
Candidates, and decide, after careful consideration, to which of them
he could conscientiously give his vote on the proud occasion of exer-
cising, for the first time, his electoral privilege, and, not for the first
time, his donkey, by whose agency, wreathed with artificial flowers,
tastefully constructed out of carrots and turnips, the residuum of his
stock, he intends to make his debut at the polling-booth. His class
having been recently under oppression, feels it to be more than ever nis
duty to get into words of three syllables as fast as he can, that he may
make no mistake, but vote only for those Candi-dates who will pledge
themselves—one of them he understands is likely to be an opulent pawn-
broker in Whitechapel—to stand by the coster’s barrow, and put their
shoulder to his cart-wheel. Being unmarried, his house in Little Back
Trotter Street is kept by a maiden sister, who, since she heard that
single women will have votes given them by the next Reform Bill, has
always a Political Treatise in her hand at meal-times, and in the few
minutes she can snatch from peeling potatoes and other domestic
duties. Every evening, on his return from the Night School, they
dictate to each other over a quartern.
Thomas Hodman, bricklayer’s labourer. Every morning when lie
awakes says to himself but in a subdued tone, that he may not disturb his
wife who has a bit of a temper, “ And I, too, am an elector.” Takes a
weekly paper, but instead of reading as he used to do the trials at the
Old Bailey, police cases, railway accidents, and fights for £50 a-side
now cares for nothing but the leading articles, parliamentary intelli-
gence, and letters from “Plebicola” and “ Harmodious Harristoghitou”
on the evils of primogeniture, the profligate waste of Capitular Estab-
lishments, and the injustice of promotion by purchase in the Army.
Reflects on these and other anomalies in our political system, as,
followiughis daily calling, he goes up and down the ladder, and balances
the merits and demerits of Administration by Boards. His last thought
before going to sleep at night is the same as his waking whisper—“ And
I, too, am an elector.” Black-eyes never seen now. Thinks Bright a
great brick, and hopes he will get on the top round of the ladder.
Joseph Badgley, omnibus conductor. Passes the Houses of Parlia-
ment many times everyday, and never without thinking of the personal
interest he will soon have in the Westminster line. Considers the
extension of the Suffrage a step in the right direction, and hopes it will
be a good thing for poor people who are not invariably “full inside.”
(Is told that the same thing has been said before, but then as a
joke.) Not much inclined for study when he goes home after
sixteen hours’ work, but reads the paper by bits every day, par-
ticularly the leaders, subject to interruptions from passengers
(especially the females) plucking at him, punching him with their
umbrellas and sticks, inquiring whether they are right for Knights-
bridge when they are close to Astley’s, and wanting change for half-a-
sovereign in the midst of a heavy shower. Doesn’t know much about
the Constitution, except that wet weather is bad for his, and won’t
vote for any Member who will not support a Bill to give him and
’Arry (driver) every other Sunday to themselves. As a matter of
secondary importance, would be glad to see timekeepers abolished.
Used to fancy he knew the difference between a Tory and a Liberal,
and that it was as great as between a black and a bay, but confused
now, and thinks they are more like piebalds than anything else.
Gkorge Weightman, Porter.—Has given up public houses, skittles,
smoking, and every other bad propensity, and stops at home at night
reading the debates in Parliament aloud to his family. Attaches great
weight to the speeches of those Members who talk about carrying good
measures and easing the country of some of its burdens. Never now
goes near “The Old Black Horse,” except to the meetings of the
“ Kmancipated Serfs,” a Debating Club which assembles there on
Wednesdays and Saturdays at eight, discusses the events of the week
and the affairs of Europe, and breaks up about twelve.
Lionel D’Almaine De Beauvoir.—Five-aud-thirty. Five thousand
a year. Director of several Companies. Member of sundry Clubs and
Societies. Has been in Parliament for Young Sarum, but unseated on
petition. Income being all derived from Public Securities, Shares, &c.
and as a bachelor living iu lodgings, never had a vote, never wished for
one, and now that he comes under the Lodger clause in the Bill is very
doubtful whether he shall take any trouble about registration, and
almost certain that the Members for Pimlicopolis will uot derive any
advantage from his name being on the Electoral Roll. Valet has had a
vote for many years ; he, or rather his wife, keeping a lodging-house in
Great Wriothesley Street.
(Extracts from Country Reports reserved for another communication.)
High Stakes.
Meat is lower, thanks to joint action on the part of consumers.
The butchers have been brought down on their marrow-bones. But
they must be looked after, and not forgotten, now that the dead season
is over, or they wdl screw their courage to the sticking-point, and soon
saddle us again with a penny or two too much in the pound.
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
223
—CV,
FREEDOM IN FRANCE.
he other day, some per-
sons having met together
peaceably in the cemetery
of Montmartre, were
pounced upon by the police
and carried off to_ prison,
on the charge of having
formed a treasonable as-
sembly. The liberal French
journals, having ventured
to demur to the legality
of the arrest, have been
Hooded with a deluge of
“communiques” from Go-
vernment, and ere long
doubtless will be “warned,”
in future, to abstain from
criticising the police. In
France it is an axiom that
policemen are infallible, like
Popes, and can never be
mistaken in making an
arrest. We think, however,
that the question What is
an assembly ? should be le-
gally debated, that French-
men may know, with some
degree of accuracy, what
number of persons are held by law to constitute a treasonable meeting :
and some notion should be given of the proofs by which the Govern-
ment can now convince its law courts that, when a score or two of
people have chanced to come together, their meeting is intended for a
treasonable end.
The French Government at present seems so much to fear a crowd,
that we really almost wonder that the theatres are suffered to perform
attractive pieces, lest by doing so they happen to obtain a crowded
house. We are surprised, too, that French playgoers are not by law
forbidden to assemble in the street, before the opening of the doors.
Conspirators might readily arrange to meet together, and staud quietly
en queue until the time came for admission, and thus it would be easy
for them all to sit together, and hold traitorous assemblies in the
gallery or pit.
For the benefit of strangers, the word “assembly” should be clearly
and legally defined; else some day we may hear that Mb. Smith has
been arrested for happening to join an assembly in an omnibus, or that
unhappy Mb. Jones has been clapped in a French prison, because,
while stopping for a moment to stare at a shop window, he chanced to
be surrounded by some half-a-dozen persons, who stopped to do the
same. Any pressure in a crowd just now is perilous in Paris, for in
the streets as in the newspapers, the Government sets its face against
the freedom of the press.
AMONGST THE MASSES.
Special Commissioners accredited from the Court of St. Punch—it
may interest, but cannot surprise Everybody, to hear that the compe-
tition for these posts of honour was of the keenest, not to say of the
savagest intensity, especially when it became known that the remune-
ration was twice as much as Revising Barristers and Boundary
Commissioners are awarded by a penurious Government—have been
engaged during the Parliamentary recess in ascertaining by a personal
and daily inquiry, with an interval allowed for luncheon, how far the
various tribes of the people who, under the new Reform Bill will
acquire votes, are educating and fitting themselves for the proper
discharge of their important function, with or without the aid of stimu-
lants and. local solicitors, at the next General Election, and in what
light, lurid or sunny, they regard the responsibility of the Franchise.
A few of the cases cited in the Commissioners’ voluminous reports
(accompanied by Maps, Plans, Appendixes and Evidence,) written
after dinner in the leading London Restaurants and best provincial
Hotels, on foolscap half-margin, slightly smelling of smoke, and deli-
vered by Queen’s Messengers at all hours of the night at our Bureau,
may be useful reading for the Legislature now in November assembled,
and all orders and degrees of men—and with both eyes to the possibi-
lities ol the future—women amongst us.
It will be observed that the S. C. have, in most instances, given the
sentiments rather than the exact language of the representative men
whom they interrogated.
William Moakes, costermonger. Education imperfect in youth.
Finding that the Reform Bill would give him a voice, rather a hoarse
one he admits, iu the representation of Hoxton, began from the very
day the measure became law regularly to attend an Adult Night School,
that he might be able to peruse the bills on the walls in different
colours, explaining the different political opinions of the different
Candidates, and decide, after careful consideration, to which of them
he could conscientiously give his vote on the proud occasion of exer-
cising, for the first time, his electoral privilege, and, not for the first
time, his donkey, by whose agency, wreathed with artificial flowers,
tastefully constructed out of carrots and turnips, the residuum of his
stock, he intends to make his debut at the polling-booth. His class
having been recently under oppression, feels it to be more than ever nis
duty to get into words of three syllables as fast as he can, that he may
make no mistake, but vote only for those Candi-dates who will pledge
themselves—one of them he understands is likely to be an opulent pawn-
broker in Whitechapel—to stand by the coster’s barrow, and put their
shoulder to his cart-wheel. Being unmarried, his house in Little Back
Trotter Street is kept by a maiden sister, who, since she heard that
single women will have votes given them by the next Reform Bill, has
always a Political Treatise in her hand at meal-times, and in the few
minutes she can snatch from peeling potatoes and other domestic
duties. Every evening, on his return from the Night School, they
dictate to each other over a quartern.
Thomas Hodman, bricklayer’s labourer. Every morning when lie
awakes says to himself but in a subdued tone, that he may not disturb his
wife who has a bit of a temper, “ And I, too, am an elector.” Takes a
weekly paper, but instead of reading as he used to do the trials at the
Old Bailey, police cases, railway accidents, and fights for £50 a-side
now cares for nothing but the leading articles, parliamentary intelli-
gence, and letters from “Plebicola” and “ Harmodious Harristoghitou”
on the evils of primogeniture, the profligate waste of Capitular Estab-
lishments, and the injustice of promotion by purchase in the Army.
Reflects on these and other anomalies in our political system, as,
followiughis daily calling, he goes up and down the ladder, and balances
the merits and demerits of Administration by Boards. His last thought
before going to sleep at night is the same as his waking whisper—“ And
I, too, am an elector.” Black-eyes never seen now. Thinks Bright a
great brick, and hopes he will get on the top round of the ladder.
Joseph Badgley, omnibus conductor. Passes the Houses of Parlia-
ment many times everyday, and never without thinking of the personal
interest he will soon have in the Westminster line. Considers the
extension of the Suffrage a step in the right direction, and hopes it will
be a good thing for poor people who are not invariably “full inside.”
(Is told that the same thing has been said before, but then as a
joke.) Not much inclined for study when he goes home after
sixteen hours’ work, but reads the paper by bits every day, par-
ticularly the leaders, subject to interruptions from passengers
(especially the females) plucking at him, punching him with their
umbrellas and sticks, inquiring whether they are right for Knights-
bridge when they are close to Astley’s, and wanting change for half-a-
sovereign in the midst of a heavy shower. Doesn’t know much about
the Constitution, except that wet weather is bad for his, and won’t
vote for any Member who will not support a Bill to give him and
’Arry (driver) every other Sunday to themselves. As a matter of
secondary importance, would be glad to see timekeepers abolished.
Used to fancy he knew the difference between a Tory and a Liberal,
and that it was as great as between a black and a bay, but confused
now, and thinks they are more like piebalds than anything else.
Gkorge Weightman, Porter.—Has given up public houses, skittles,
smoking, and every other bad propensity, and stops at home at night
reading the debates in Parliament aloud to his family. Attaches great
weight to the speeches of those Members who talk about carrying good
measures and easing the country of some of its burdens. Never now
goes near “The Old Black Horse,” except to the meetings of the
“ Kmancipated Serfs,” a Debating Club which assembles there on
Wednesdays and Saturdays at eight, discusses the events of the week
and the affairs of Europe, and breaks up about twelve.
Lionel D’Almaine De Beauvoir.—Five-aud-thirty. Five thousand
a year. Director of several Companies. Member of sundry Clubs and
Societies. Has been in Parliament for Young Sarum, but unseated on
petition. Income being all derived from Public Securities, Shares, &c.
and as a bachelor living iu lodgings, never had a vote, never wished for
one, and now that he comes under the Lodger clause in the Bill is very
doubtful whether he shall take any trouble about registration, and
almost certain that the Members for Pimlicopolis will uot derive any
advantage from his name being on the Electoral Roll. Valet has had a
vote for many years ; he, or rather his wife, keeping a lodging-house in
Great Wriothesley Street.
(Extracts from Country Reports reserved for another communication.)
High Stakes.
Meat is lower, thanks to joint action on the part of consumers.
The butchers have been brought down on their marrow-bones. But
they must be looked after, and not forgotten, now that the dead season
is over, or they wdl screw their courage to the sticking-point, and soon
saddle us again with a penny or two too much in the pound.