“Ah! my dear, all is not gold that glitters. There is more sterling metal in your father’s salesman, mark my words, than in the tinselled lieutenant,” was the summing-up of the elder, as she replaced cake and wine in side-board and cellaret. She was clearly no friend to Aspinall now that he had recovered sense and sight.
The town, which had been strong and outspoken in its condemnation of the new king during the trial of Queen Caroline, was now all alive with preparations to celebrate his coronation with befitting magnificence, one branch of trade vying with another which should make the greatest display in the coming procession to the Green, the like of which never had been, and never would be again. And this competition, productive of marvellous results, due, in a great measure, to trade rivalry and an ambitious desire to outshine, was set down by historians, rightly or wrongly, as a proof of the excessive loyalty of the Mancestrians.
In all classes, from the highest to the lowest, something was being done, and nothing was talked of, thought of, dreamed of, but the coronation and the procession. In courts, and alleys there were making, and mending, and washing, and no little pinching was undergone by hard-working fathers and mothers to provide the girls with white cambric frocks, tippets, and net caps, or the lads with fresh jackets and breeches and shoes, so as not to disgrace the Sunday-schools under whose banners they were to walk.
The finest horses of the Old Quay Company and Pickford’s were put into new harness and the finest condition, and every lurry (a long, flat, sideless waggon) was called into requisition. Smiths, saddlers, sign and scene painters, were at work day and night for weeks; and such was the request for banners that ladies undertook the work when skilled labour was not to be found.
The important ceremony was fixed for the 19th of July. On the 17th a deputation of small-ware weavers waited on Mr. Ashton in despair. They could get neither flag nor banner; the painter had thrown over the order at the last moment.
“An’ Tummy Worthington’s getten a foine un, measter. It’ll be a sheame an’ a disgrace to us o’ if we let Worthington’s cut us eawt.”
[The said Worthington was a rival small-ware manufacturer].
Mr. Ashton had recourse to his snuff-box, and then to his wife.
“My dear, what is to be done? There will be no flag. The painters cannot execute the jobs in hand. Worthington’s have a fine one I hear.”
“No flag! That will never do. We must have a flag. Let me consider.”