Quoth Sir John Pratt, the ‘settlement’ suspended did remain,
Living the husband; but, him dead, it doth revive again.”
[30] It must have been named after Admiral Pellew (Lord Exmouth), who captured Algiers in 1816.
LECTURE VII
Mid-Victorianism. W. M. Thackeray
The word respectable has a strange history. In the days of the later Roman Empire its equivalent “spectabilis” was applied to the highest dignitaries. In France it is a title of honour—“votre respectable mère” means something very different from “your respectable mother.” In England respectability is associated with primness, faded clothes, and possibly necessary penuriousness. One would not seek a way to a lady’s good graces by describing her as a respectable woman. When we say a man’s abilities are “respectable,” it is in order to get someone else to give him employment. It is a word which conveys ridicule ever since the famous dialogue in Thurtell’s trial for murder:
Witness. The prisoner was a respectable man.
Counsel. What do you mean by respectable?
Witness. Well—er—he kept a gig.
The characteristic of Mid-Victorian society was respectability, and I shall try to show that its chief exponent W. M. Thackeray was its prophet.