That the thunder you’ll hear
May soon purge the air,
And then that the coast
May be clear at the last.
BOLINGBROKE’S CHARACTER.
This unclean and menacing pamphlet offended Tories who were not altogether Jacobites. It was not answered, no one could stoop to do that, but it was followed by a sixpenny pamphlet, from More’s, ‘near Fleet Street,’ in which Bolingbroke was rather ill-defended by one of those friends whose precious balsam aggravates rather than heals. The writer, however, was earnest. With regard to Bolingbroke’s idle talk at table over his wine, the anonymous advocate observed:—‘My Lord, everybody knows, drank deep enough of those Draughts which generally produce Secrets, and had Enemies enough to give Air to the least unguarded Expressions in favour of the Pretender.’ To the not unnatural query of the Whigs,—‘Why did he fly?’ Bolingbroke’s champion loftily replies:—‘My Lord had too elegant a Taste of Life to part with it, to gratify only the Resentments of his Enemies! If he was a Rake, it was his nature that was to be blamed; if he was a Villain, no one could charge him with hypocritically attempting to hide it.’ ‘As to personal Frailties, his Lordship had his Share, and never strove to hide them by the sanctified cover which Men of high Stations generally affect; whose private Intrigues are carried on with as much Gravity as the Mysteries of State. His Faults and Levities were owing to his Complexion, and that Life and Humour with which he enlivened them, made them so pleasing that those who condemned the Action could not but approve the Person. A vein of Mirth and Gaiety were as inseparable from his Conversation, as an Air of Love and Dignity from his Personage, and a Greatness of Spirit from his Soul.’
Meanwhile, Lady St. John, Bolingbroke’s mother, was showing to everybody at Court a letter from her son to his father, in which he protested that he was perfectly innocent of carrying on any intrigue with the Pretender. Of which letter, says Lady Cowper, ‘I have taken a copy, but I believe it won’t serve his turn.’
POLITICS IN LIVERY.
Court and parliament being agitated, the lackeys imitated their betters. The footmen, in waiting for their masters, who were members of Parliament, had free access to Westminster Hall. For six and thirty years they had imitated their masters, by electing a ‘Speaker’ among themselves, whenever the members made a more exalted choice within their own House. The Whig lackeys were for Mr. Strickland’s man. The Tory liveried gentry resolved to elect Sir Thomas Morgan’s fellow. A battle-royal ensued in place of an election. The combatants were hard at it, when the House broke up, and the members wanted their coaches. Wounds were then hastily bandaged, but their pain nursed wrath. On the next night, the hostile parties, duly assembled, attacked each other with fury. The issue was long uncertain, but finally the Tory footmen gained a costly victory, in celebration of which Sir Thomas Morgan’s servant, terribly battered, was carried three times triumphantly round the Hall. There was no malice. The lackeys clubbed together for drink at a neighbouring ale-house, where the host gave them a dinner gratis. The dinner was made expressly to create insatiable thirst, and before the banquet came to a close, every man was as drunk as his master.
SATIRE.