This ingenious person distributed a card embellished with flowers and insects, upon which was engraven an advertisement, stating the exhibition to be the labour of thirty years, and to contain "a great variety of beautiful objects equal to nature." Likewise enabled to gratify them.
"With bones, scales, and eyes, from the prawn to the porpoise,
Fruit, flies, birds, and flowers, oh, strange metamorphose!"
["Quid Rides?"]
"People," says Mr. De Morgan, "are apt to believe that a smart saying or a ready retort are not a real occurrence; it was made up: it is too good to be true, &c." Perhaps there is no story which would be held more intrinsically deniable than that of the tobacconist who adopted Quid rides? for his motto on his carriage.
A friend, whose years, it will be seen, are many, has given me the following note:—
"Jacob Brandon was a tobacco-broker in the last century, a remarkable man in his way, supposed to be rich, a good companion, and extravagant in his expenses. Before the year 1800, I saw a chariot in Cheapside with a coat-of-arms, or rather a shield bearing a hand (sample) of tobacco and a motto, Quid rides? It was an old carriage, and at the time belonged to a job-master, so the driver told a person who was curious to know what the arms meant. It was this man's curiosity that caused my noticing the arms. Mentioning the circumstance in my father's presence, he said it was Brandon's old carriage. He had become gouty, and could not walk; he bought the carriage, had it newly painted, and was asked for his arms. This required consideration. Some thought Brandon was a Jew, or of Jewish extraction. Be this as it may, he loved a joke, and cared little for armorial bearings. He was telling a party in Lloyd's Coffee-house about his new carriage, and that he had determined to have a symbol of his profession on it, but that he wanted a motto. A well-known member of Lloyd's, a wit, and, as I afterwards found out, a curious reader, suggested Quid rides? which was forthwith adopted. This was Harry Calendon. I knew him well; he died within the present century. I have found that some of his witty stories about living persons were taken from old books. My father knew Brandon well, and employed him. Now, as to Quid rides? being proposed by some Irish wit as a motto for Lundy Foot, of Dublin, famous for a particular snuff, I have heard something of the history and habits of Lundy Foot; he had no carriage with arms on it. His snuff is still sold with its distinguishing wrapper and stamp, but no Quid rides?—which would certainly have been perpetuated if it had ever been adopted by the manufacturer of the snuff."
["Bolton Trotters."]
This was the cognomen given to the muslin-weavers of Bolton in the days of their prosperity. The trade was that of a gentleman. They brought home their work in top-boots and ruffled shirts, carried a cane, and in some instances took a coach. Many weavers at that time used to walk about the street with a five-pound Bank of England note spread out under their hatbands; they would smoke none but long "churchwarden" pipes, and objected to the intrusion of any other handicraftsmen into the particular rooms in the public-houses which they frequented.
The "Bolton Trotters" were much addicted to practical joking, of which Mr. French, in his Life of Samuel Crompton, narrates this story:—"One of the craft visiting Bolton on a market-day, having delivered his work at the manufacturing warehouse, and obtained materials for his succeeding work, placed them carefully in one end of his blue linen wallet, and filled the other end with articles of clothing and provisions, upon which he had expended his recently received wages. He had, however, reserved a portion for his accustomed potation upon such occasions; and that he might enjoy this solace of his labour in comfort and safety, he left his wallet at the warehouse before visiting his favourite tavern. The good ale did its office, and when elevated to just the proper pitch for trotting, he met a brother of the loom, who, like himself, had transacted his day's business, and was now ready to trudge home with his wallet on his shoulder. The two weavers mingled with a little crowd gathered together to hear the strains of the Bolton volunteer band performing near the Swan Hotel. He who had left his wallet at the warehouse was not, however, too much engrossed by the martial music to neglect the tempting opportunity to trot his quondam friend, with whom he stood shoulder to shoulder, though each looked in a different direction. Provided with a needle and stout thread, and being the shorter man of the two, he had no difficulty in sewing the edge of his neighbour's well-filled wallet to the lapel of his own velveteen jacket, and then, during a momentary movement in the crowd, adroitly hitched it from his neighbour's to his own shoulder. An immediate and clamorous charge of robbery was made, and met by an indignant denial from the trotter, who coolly remonstrated with the loser on his culpable want of ordinary care, pointing out, at the same time, at the means he had taken to secure his own wallet, which no one, he said, could steal from him. This evidence was unanswerable, particularly as it was supported by many of the bystanders who had seen the whole transaction, and joined heartily in the laugh at the weaver who had been so effectually trotted for their amusement. A reconciliation was effected through the ordinary means on these occasions, of an adjournment to the alehouse."