“The Gridiron; or, Cook’s Weekly Register.” First number, March 23, 1822. Here are specimens of it:—
[“Our present intention is, principally, to exterminate Cobbett from the political world. The time required to effect this, of course, cannot be distinctly defined.…
“In our immediate attacks upon Cobbett, we request our readers to excuse the coarseness of the language adopted.”
“Farmers’ wives.—It is now but a few years since that an old shameless, wicked fellow rose up from his bed to pray for your husbands’ destruction. This wicked fellow’s name is no other than Cobbett,” &c.]
No. 2 speaks of the increasing demand for the first number. No. 3 is reduced to sixpence, for the purpose of affording a more general circulation. No. 4, ?????
All this anonymous rubbish did more good than harm, as obvious hypocrisy always will, under similar circumstances. A more respectable opponent was Henry White, a well-known Whig writer of the day. People said he was jealous of Cobbett. He was a very able man, and had himself been well abused by the Times and other papers, on account of his strict partisanship. After many years of animadversion, he produced “A Calm Appeal to the Friends of Freedom and Reform, on the Double Dealings of Mr. Cobbett, and the baneful tendency of his Writings. With a vindication of the Whigs, and the Patriots of Westminster and the Borough of Southwark, against his Scurrilous and Malignant Aspersions. By Henry White, late editor of the Independent Whig, the Charles James Fox, the Independent Observer, the Sunday Times, the Public Cause, &c., &c.” (London, 1823). Referring to his own party, White says, “What virtue, what wisdom, what real patriotism there is in the country, he knows they possess.”
CHAPTER XXIV.
“THEY COMPLAIN THAT THE TWOPENNY TRASH IS READ.”
The ruin which was overtaking all the agricultural interest during the last years of the Regency, put a finishing stroke to the little estate at Botley. It had been heavily mortgaged for some years past; and upon Mr. Cobbett’s return from America, he found himself stripped of everything in the shape of realizable property. The profits from the Register were comparatively smaller than of old; for, although the circulation was prodigious, the expense of its distribution was also very great. The establishment of another daily paper[1] probably added to his pecuniary difficulties. At last there was no resource but bankruptcy, which took place in the course of 1820. The creditors were few, and acted very generously; and Mr. Cobbett afterwards refers to them with the kindliest feelings. One of them, indeed (Mr. George Rogers, of Southampton), went further; and paid the damages and costs in Wright’s action, which followed very soon after the certificate in bankruptcy was issued. The low ebb at which his fortunes now stood, are best described in Cobbett’s own words:—