The speaker was "imaginary," though the burning down half a College library was a true bill, and the ringleader in this exploit afterwards attained high rank as a politician. But these composite portraits are seldom satisfactory, and in this instance the resultant monstrosity ceases to be representative. The House of Lords was not exclusively composed of black sheep at any time, and on the whole more dangerous scoundrels have made their way into the elected House. But here, as so often happens, Punch provides the antidote to his own bane. In 1886, under the heading "A Radical Snob," he reprints what Thackeray wrote in his own pages just forty years earlier:—
"Perhaps, after all, there's no better friend to Conservatism than your outrageous Radical Snob. When a man preaches to you that all Noblemen are tyrants, that all Clergymen are hypocrites or liars, that all Capitalists are scoundrels, banded together in an infamous conspiracy to deprive the people of their rights, he creates a wholesome revulsion of feeling in favour of the abused parties, and a sense of fair play leads the generous heart to take a side with the object of unjust oppression.
"The frantic dwarf ... becomes a most wicked and dangerous Snob when he gets the ear of people more ignorant than himself, inflames them with lies, and misleads them into ruin."
Yet, when all allowance has been made for inconsistency and extravagance, we cannot deny that a strongly marked vein of discontent and dissatisfaction—often too well-grounded—with the "scheme of things in general" runs through the pages of Punch throughout these years, culminating in a dismal explosion of pessimism in March, 1884, over the decadence, the degeneracy and the vulgarity of the age:—
THE "ZEIT-GEIST"
Oh, for the Muse that laughed and stung
On Gulliver's indignant tongue!
Curt was his speech and fierce and strong,
In lofty scorn of Cant and Wrong,—
And small indeed the times that teach
Weakness of grip for strength of speech,