Burdett, the ex-Radical champion, still in his congenial character of “Don Quixote,” is next shown attacking the “Lion of Democracy.” The picture of this adventure is entitled “The Last and Highest Point at which the Unheard-of Courage of Don Quixote ever did, or could arrive, with the Happy Conclusion.” “An Old Song to a New Tune” (June 17, 1837), shows the Whig wherry reduced to make great exertions to keep ahead; of the six rowers, the faces of Palmerston, Duncannon, and Melbourne are alone shown; Lord John Russell is steering. The passengers are John Bull, with an uneasy expression, seated beside the king, who is evidently upset by the motion, and looks very unwell. The parody runs—
“Row, brothers, row,
The stream runs fast,
The Raddies[76] are near,
And our daylight’s past.”
Leader’s fate over the Westminster contest (June 17, 1837) is summed up as “A Dead Horse—a Sorry Subject,—what was once a Leader in the Bridgwater Coach; supposed to have been driven to Death by his Cruel Masters.” Hume is driving off the defeated in a knacker’s cart.
“We, the People of England” (July 1837), exhibits Messrs. Hume, Roebuck, and Wakley as the “Three Tailors of Tooley Street,” all three sitting cross-legged; the former, slate in hand, is working out one of his grand historic “tottles.”
The candidature of General Evans for Westminster is summed up as “Reorganizing the Legion” (24 July, 1837). The boardmen all appear in ragged regimentals, as the remnant of the Spanish Legion, and a very woebegone set they seem; the fugleman, wearing a cocked hat, has a pictorial placard of a leader taking to flight, with the legend, “I run;” the posters appear chiefly designed to canvass “Murray for Westminster;” and General Evans is himself trying to make the file straight with his malacca cane, while crying, “Eyes right.”
Sir Francis Burdett had, in his altered politics, fought, conquered, and made his final bow at the hustings of Westminster, he being at the time in indifferent health; his return for Wiltshire was the next point of interest. How far this change of constituency suited the baronet’s own constitution is displayed by HB, who had previously exhibited the subject of his sportive humour under his gouty infirmity. “Grinding Young” (July 25, 1837) is the title of a new application of an old fancy; Burdett, broken by age and debility, with his foot swathed in flannel, showing the gouty foe triumphant, is hobbling with a crutch up the ladder which leads from “Westminster” to the wonderful mill; and, presto! an agriculturist turns the handle, and forth from the hopper emerges the baronet in his familiar guise, spick, span, and spruce, with the elastic smartness and activity of youth, he is stepping out into “North Wilts.”
An ingenious election skit appeared on Lord Durham’s appeal to the local constituency: it is entitled, “The Newest Universal Medicine” (July 27, 1837). Lord Durham appears as a compounder of quack nostrums; he wears an apron, and is standing at a counter, stirring with a pestle a mortar containing his novel mixture. Beneath it is his “Letter to the Electors of Durham,” and around are the varied ingredients of his “Universal Panacea”—such as “Conservative Opiate,” “Radical Alcohol,” with “Whig Alkali;” while all sorts of colours are ready to hand, indigo, and orange, light blue, mustard (Durham), and verdigris. While mixing his pills, Lord Durham is exclaiming “Now to extinguish that Quack Morison!” A large box stands ready for the medicament, addressed to “Daniel O’Connell, Esq., M.P., General Association and Trades-Union, Dublin;” a smaller box is directed to the Bishop of Exeter. On a chair stands a small collection of the quack compounds and remedies in boxes of various hues, and addressed to the Times, Standard, Globe, and Morning Chronicle, indicative of Lord Durham’s versatile talents and scribbling propensities.
A touching allegory for a rejected candidate was furnished by HB over these same elections. “As You like It” (July 31, 1837). The wounded and solitary deer which has come down to the brook, presents the lachrymose countenance of Roebuck; the shaft which has caused his tears is marked “Bath.” Lord John Russell, as the “Melancholy Jacques,” is, from the other side of the water, soliloquizing over the Roebuck’s fate.
Dr. Bowring is favoured with a place in Doyle’s portrait-gallery, as “The Rejected of Kilmarnock” (August 21, 1837).
Another defeat at the general election forms food for HB’s playful irony. This time it is Joseph Hume rejected by Middlesex: “Figurative Representation of the Late Catastrophe” (August 31, 1837). The Middlesex balloon is sailing majestically out of reach; the gentleman thrown out is descending at a fine pace; Joseph Hume’s parachute is blown inside out, and he is ejaculating in his fall, “Now, unless some friendly dunghill receives me, I am lost for ever.” Below him are the green plains of Erin, and the spot on which the discomfited aeronaut is descending is shown to be Kilkenny.