A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering 34

A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering 34

Further allusions to the respective Houses of Stuart and Hanover may

be detected in the plate, “Canvassing for Votes,” in the signs of the

“Royal Oak,” _versus_ “The Crown.” All the taverns are pressed into

the service of the candidates as a matter of course, the enterprising

competitors striving to secure the preponderance of publicans, their

interest, friends, and followers. “Tim Partitool, Esq.,” possibly a

hit at Bubb Dodington, whose person, as sketched by Hogarth, may be

identified in at least one picture of this series, is located at the

“Royal Oak.” This enterprising gentleman, as depicted on his canvass,

is nicknamed “Punch,” also indicative of Bubb’s unmistakable figure. A

porter has brought two packages, evidently polling cards, inscribed,

“Sir, your vote and interest;” one of these parcels is directed “at

Punch’s, at the ‘Royal Oak’ Yard,” and to the candidate in question the

bearer is presenting a note with the superscription, “Tim Partitool,

Esq.” Above this gentleman’s head, and partly concealing the painted

signboard of Charles II. in the oak, with the three crowns of the

United Kingdom among the branches, is a pictorial poster in two

compartments. In the upper one are shown the Treasury and Horse Guards,

both burlesqued; while from the tall story of the former flows a stream

of gold, which is being packed into sacks for conveyance by waggon into

the country--there to be distributed for the purposes of bribery--to

strengthen the party already in power, known as the Old Interest (their

own). The way this is to come about is shown in the lower compartment

of the painted cloth: “Punch, candidate for Guzzledown,” the

_farceur_, with his protuberant rotundity of back and corporation, has

a wheel-barrow before him, filled with bags of money, marked £7000 and

£9000, and in all amounting to a considerable sum; he is casting about

the broad-pieces in a shower from a ladle, and they are caught in the

hats of expectant electors.

 

“See from the Treasury flows the gold,

To show that those who’re _bought_ are _sold_!

Come, Perjury, meet it on the road--

’Tis all your own--a waggon-load.

Ye party fools, ye courtier tribe,

Who gain no vote without a bribe,

Lavishly kind, yet insincere,

Behold in Punch yourselves appear.

And you, ye fools, who poll for pay,

Ye little great men of a day,

For whom your favourite will not care,

Observe how much bewitch’d you are.”

 

The candidate is treating all around, within the inn, as seen in

the bar-parlour, his followers are feeding gluttonously; in the

balcony above are two fair nymphs, whose favour he is conciliating

by purchasing trinkets from a Jew pedlar. A farmer voter of some

influence, probably a squire of the Tony Lumpkin order, who has ridden

into Guzzledown, is making the most of his opportunities: the landlords

of the rival inns are ostensibly pressing him to accept invitations

to dinner at the respective head-quarters; the host of the Royal Oak

is pouring a shower of silver into the receptive palm held out by the

wary elector, while the other hand receives the broad golden retainer

of “The Crown.” The landlady has a lapful of money, while one of

George’s grenadiers (like those seen in “The March to Finchley”) is

slyly watching the reckoning of the plunder, probably with an eye to

spoliation on his own account. The Crown, which is also the Excise

Office, is the scene of an animated contest, rival bludgeon-men are

in fierce conflict at the doorway, furniture and stones are being

thrown about, and a man from the window is discharging a gun into the

thick of the fray below--an allusion to a murderous episode which

really occurred. The sign of the Crown, suspended to a huge beam, is

in process of removal; a man above, on the wrong side of the support,

is sawing it through, while confederates below are dragging it down

by force: this is also figurative--the man above, who is assisting to

demolish the Crown, will come down simultaneously, while those beneath

it will be crushed by its fall. At a third house is the sign of the

Porto Bello, at the side door of which is seen a barber demonstrating

with pieces of tobacco-pipe the manner in which Porto Bello was itself

taken with six ships only; his companion, a cobbler, has given up work,

having received sufficient money from the elections to afford to forego

toil for the present.

 

[Illustration: THE ELECTION AT OXFORD.--CANVASSING FOR VOTES. BY W.

HOGARTH. 1754.]

 

[Illustration: THE OXFORDSHIRE ELECTION--THE POLLING BOOTH. BY W.

HOGARTH. 1754.

 

[_Page 145._]

 

The view of the Polling Booth is full of intention. Within, seated at

the back, on a raised platform, are the sheriffs or bailiffs with whom

the election rests, and their attendant, the beadle; in the front

are the poll clerks, with their register-books, and the lawyers to see

the testaments duly offered for attesting the oath; in the left corner,

a veteran (the Militia Bill peeps out of his pocket), who has lost

both arms and one leg, is touching the testament with the iron hook

which does duty for his missing hand; the clerk is trying to stifle

his laughter, while the opposition lawyer is energetically protesting

against this proceeding as informal. Hogarth has literally brought “the

blind and the halt” to the hustings; in fact, as was too frequently

witnessed on these occasions, he has introduced the extremes to which

recourse was had,--a pitiable idiot, in a hopeless stage of imbecility,

is brought up to the poll in a chair; this poor creature’s mind is

too far gone to distinguish between his right and left hands; the

clerk is vainly endeavouring to get the proper attestation, while the

keeper, or mad doctor, Dr. Shebbeare,[47] whose legs are adorned with

fetters as a felon, is prompting his charge; a political letter of the

doctor’s is shown in his pocket. Another victim, evidently on the verge

of dissolution, is smuggled up to the booth in an unconscious state,

wrapped in a blanket and carried by two repulsive ruffians; one of them

is puffing a blast of tobacco smoke full in the face of the dying man,

to whose night-cap is pinned a “True Blue” favour.

 

“Swift, reverend wag, Iërne’s pride,

Who lov’d the comic rein to guide,

Has told us, ‘Jailors, when they please,

Let out their flock to rob for fees.’

From this sage hint, in needful cases,

The wights, who govern other places,

Let out their crew for private ends--

_Ergo_, to serve themselves and friends.

Behold, here gloriously inclin’d

The Sick, the Lame, the Halt, and Blind!

From Workhouse, Jail, and Hospital,

Submissive come, true Patriots all!

 

* * * * *

 

And ’scaped from wars and foreign clutches,

An Invalid’s behind on crutches.”

 

Drinking is still proceeding, and “dying speeches” are hawked about,

with the usual heading of a rude woodcut of the gallows, in allusion

most probably to a local occurrence which produced considerable

agitation amongst the public at large--the passions of the multitude

having been set into a flame, in the absence of political excitement,

by the trial and execution at Oxford, in 1753, of a young woman, Mary

Blandy, for poisoning her father under rather romantic circumstances;

she persisted in asserting her innocence, even on the scaffold; a

number of pamphlets were published upon her case, which became the

subject of warm dispute.

 

All these “Election” plates are rich in suggestive allusions, the

meaning of many of which are now lost. Hogarth in his third plate

has indulged in simple allegory. Britannia’s state coach is in

difficulties, to which, by the aid of the check-string fastened to her

coachman’s arm, she is vainly endeavouring to draw the attention of

her driver, who has laid down his reins, being otherwise engaged; the

two servants on the box are absorbed in a game of cards, while one is

cheating,--an allusion to the extravagant gambling propensities which,

to so large and notorious an extent, disfigured society in general, and

particularly (at this time) those charged with the interests of the

kingdom.

 

[Illustration: THE OXFORDSHIRE ELECTION.--CHAIRING THE MEMBERS. BY W.

HOGARTH. 1754.]

 

The fourth plate, “Chairing the Members,” exhibits the last and

apparently most trying episode as regards the successful candidate; the

hero of the hour--the newly returned member, elected in the True Blue,

or New Interest--occupies a position which may have its honours, but

obviously has its perils. In place of the actually returned members,

Hogarth seems to have selected the figure of the intriguing manager of

the Leicester House party, Bubb Dodington (afterwards Lord Melcombe),

for the hero of the chairing scene. He is elevated only to find

himself surrounded with embarrassments: the dangers of his chairing

are lost sight of momentarily, for his pale face is horror-stricken

by being confronted with a fair lady of fashion; she is equally

affected by the rencontre, for she is swooning away--it is presumed

with apprehension--in the arms of her maids. Over Bubb’s head flies a

goose--a happy conception, understood to be introduced as a parody of

the “Triumph of Alexander,” by Le Brun, where that grandiose artist has

suggestively made an eagle hover over the head of his hero. In the Blue

procession following the chairmen are all the elements of an election

triumph--rough music of marrow-bones and cleavers, True Blue flags,[48]

plenty of bludgeon-men, while a “block head,” wearing the buff favour

of their opponents, is carried to ridicule the opposition. Another

humorous episode is shown in a vixenish dame sporting a buff cockade;

she has boldly broken through the ranks of the Blues, and is driving

from their midst her husband, a tailor, detected in his duplicity by

the virago, who is soundly cuffing her crestfallen “inferior moiety,”

lately deserted to the enemy. A barrel of beer has been placed in the

street for public use; a pewter measure stands beside it; the mob seems

to have used the opportunity, as a would-be drinker is discovering that

the cask is already emptied. In the distance, a second chaired member

is skilfully indicated, of whom the shadow only is seen, projected

on a wall, while he is carried along to the evident risk of limb and

life, as his gesticulations imply. Among other accessories may be noted

a tar-barrel, in preparation for a bonfire later on. The sun-dial<