Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 046.djvu/395

1839.] object that presented itself to the eyes of the lovers, was an enormous placard on a man's back, containing, in letters at least three inches long, the words "Tapps for Bellman;" and in smaller letters, "come to the poll on Tuesday the eleventh." I do not know whether any thrill of sympathetic horror rushed through the hearts of Mary and her admirer on seeing those appalling words; but it is highly probable, if they had foreseen all the misfortunes that those large red letters gave rise to, they would have wished that the father of Mr Tapps the candidate had died in his infancy, or that Tapps himself had been run over by the Manchester and Liverpool train. I have no reason to suppose, however, that any of those aspirations with regard to Mr Tapps or his father were uttered by either of our friends; so I will not detain the reader any longer, but inform him that, with a heavy heart, a large trunk, and two carpet-bags, Plantagenet Simpkinson took his departure from Buzzleton on the following day, and in due course of time arrived at his destination in the city. And there, for a short space, I leave him to his invoices and bills of lading—his three-legged stool, and his letter once a-week to the true-hearted Mary Padden.

I don't believe that there ever was a man who was a great orator, or a great poet, or a great any thing, (except perhaps a great ass,) without knowing it. There never was such a thing as a mute inglorious Milton, a dumb Demosthenes, or a blind Thomson of Duddingstone. It is therefore not to be supposed that Mr Simpkinson, senior, was ignorant of his own powers; so far from it, indeed, that I have even heard it hinted, that, if it were possible, he overrated them; but this, even if it were true, is a very venial fault, for it is surely much better to be a little anxious to discover and dwell upon modest merits, wherever they are found, whether in one's self or in others, than to deny or undervalue them. There were few things in which Mr Simpkinson found himself deficient;—history, theology, architecture, sporting, politics, business, or accomplishments, were equally at his finger-ends; but his forte, as I have already hinted in my attempt to explain the reason of his calling his son Plantagenet instead of Stubbs, was decidedly oratory. He was oratorical at breakfast, at dinner, in the newsroom, in buying a pound of snuff, in ordering a pair of trowsers. In fact, he was altogether an orator; and you could no more have stood five minutes under an archway with him than with Edmund Burke, without discovering that he was an extraordinary man. Mr Simpkinson was of no profession: it was hinted he was sleeping partner in the Chadfield clothmills, and also that he had a share in Stubbs's brewery; but whether he had entered into any of those speculations or not, does not materially concern any body but himself. Mr Padden also lived, as the phrase has it, on his means—a plain man, without much affectation, except an affectation of knowing whether any thing was "gentlemany" or not,—a sort of provincial Chesterfield, who forgave any thing, however wrong—murder itself, I verily believe—provided it were done in a gentlemanly manner. His origin, like that of the Guelph family, was unknown. He maintained a strict silence, as indeed you find is done by all the real aristocracy, on the subject of his ancient descent, and even on the inferior point of the achievements of his former days; but people in our town suspected, from an almost superhuman knowledge he displayed about ribbons and sarsenets, that he must have come from Coventry. This suspicion had been hinted to him by one or two of his acquaintance; but he showed so much touchiness and irritability on the subject, that few people would have ventured to renew the insinuation. This, I grant, is a very meagre account of our two chief inhabitants; but I hope any deficiency in exactness or resemblance will be supplied in the next edition of Lord Brougham's sketches of distinguished characters in the reigns of the two last Georges. Therein also, let it be permitted me to hope, that Tapps will not be forgotten.

On the eventful Tuesday the eleventh, the whole town rushed distractedly to the town-hall: Tapps on the one side of the chair, Hicks the rival candidate on the other; the mayor between the two, looking as like as he could to Hercules between vice and virtue; the expectant faces of the assemblage—for it was rumoured that Mr Simpkinson would speak—these, with the inferior accessories of clerks