keep the whole company standing in his presence, just as another prince does sometimes at the present day. But when he did relax, he could be a delightful companion. He possessed prodigious strength, and was very fond of displaying it at those times when he forgot his stiffness and starch. There was, however, one sad interruption to the worship and adoration with which he had hitherto been surrounded in Liverpool. The Prince of Wales (George the Fourth) and the Duke of Clarence (the sailor king) paid a visit to “the good old town.” As the stars twinkle not before the moon, and the moon herself pales before the brighter beams of the sun, so certain of our tuft-hunters here forgot the respect which was due and which they had long paid to the prince, in their anxiety to bow down and render homage to the new and passing visitors. We are not going to recount all the follies of the occasion. How the Duke of Clarence pushed a milk-pail from a poor girl’s head, in Water-street, and then astonished her with a guinea for her loss, and so forth. We shall hasten at once to a scene which took place at the Town Hall. A magnificent banquet was given there by the Mayor of the time being. The Prince of Wales, the Duke of Clarence, Prince William Frederick of Gloucester, the Earls of Derby and Sefton, with a crowd of military officers, were present. After dinner the usual toasts were proposed; then the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Clarence, each with three times three. At last it was Prince William’s turn, when, under the influence of some demon of mischief, the Mayor, instead of proposing his health, as usual, with all his titles and all the honours, foolishly consulted the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Clarence on the subject, asking in what form he should give the toast, and whether he should say Highness or Royal Highness. The answer of the Prince of Wales was said to be, “Certainly not Royal Highness, and without the honours,” while the Duke of Clarence more bluntly replied, “D—him, don’t give him at all.” The Mayor then rose and simply proposed, “The commander-in-chief of the District, Prince William Frederick of Gloucester.” It was drunk in solemn silence. The company all looked grave, as feeling that, under the influence of a higher idolatry, a gross insult had been offered to the late god of Liverpool adoration. Fierce glances were exchanged between the staff-officers and the other military men present. The prince himself writhed under the stroke, like a wounded tiger smarting under the lance of the hunter. Fire and brimstone and the devil himself flashed from his eyes, but he kept his seat. Presently the fearful and appalling silence was broken by the voice of the Mayor, calling out, as the next toast, “The lord-lieutenant of the county, with three times three,” the three times three omitted at the name of the commander-in-chief, being revived with that of the next toast. A thunderbolt falling into the midst of the party could not have caused more astonishment and excitement. There could be no mistake now. The insult was meant to be an insult, and nothing but an open, prominent, and most insulting insult. The words had hardly passed from the lips of the Mayor, when Prince William, glancing a signal to his staff, who had their eyes fixed upon him, rose from his seat and left the room, followed not only by them, but by the whole of the military officers of his command who were present, leaving the table almost deserted, the Mayor gaping in amazement, and the royal cousins astounded at the spirit which they had evoked, more, perhaps, in mischief than in wanton insolence. However that may have been, from that day forth there was an uncomfortable feeling between the people of Liverpool and Prince William. It is only just to the rest of the corporation and to the gentry of the place to state, that to a man they felt strongly that an unwarrantable insult had been offered to him. He was, we believe, persuaded of this, but he never could be cordial again. If he forgave, he could not forget, the slight and mortification to which he had been so publicly exposed.
CHAPTER VI.
Table of Contents
e have already said that, in the days of which we are speaking, the Cheshire side of the Mersey, now bridged to us by steam, was a
terra incognita to the general inhabitants of Liverpool. Almost as little was known of Aigburth, Childwall, Knotty Ash, Walton, West Derby, and so forth. Our fashionables were then satisfied to live in their comfortable town residences, without looking upon a country house and garden, and hothouse, as necessary to their existence. And we question whether they were not as happy as, we are certain they were more sociable and hospitable than, their more refined and degenerate children. We had not so many sets, cliques, and coteries. Men were more sincere than flashy in those times, and their entertainments more solid than showy. But we must not omit to give a “local habitation and a name” to some of our old leaders. The Hollinsheads lived then, and for many a day after, in the big family house near the canal. Some few respectable families lingered in Oldhall-street, to which the venerable Mrs. Linacre, who lived through so many generations, stuck to the last. Mr. Drinkwater, the father of Sir George, inhabited a large house in Water-street. Jonas Bold lived splendidly at the lower end of Redcross-street. The market at that period was held round St. George’s church, and chiefly in the space then contracted by a row of houses standing between it and the Crescent, in the rear of which stood a narrow, winding street, called Castle Ditch, communicating with Lord-street, then very narrow, and with no pretentions to attract admiration or even notice from the casual passenger, although the shops in it were always among the best in the town. In Church-street lived the old and respectable family of the Cases, now represented by Mr. J.D. Case, formerly a member of our town council, and at present a resident in Cheshire. His father, George Case, was for many years the leader of the Tory party in the ancient town council, and was, without exception, the best chairman of a public meeting whom we ever met with. Clayton-square was a strong resort of our leading and substantial merchants. Many a happy day have we spent in what was then the splendid mansion of the Rodie family. Kind, magnificent, and munificent in their hospitalities, but now, alas, without a representative of even the name surviving. Dr. Currie, so celebrated in his day, and so celebrated yet, lived in Basnett-street.
Bold-street had its Tobins, Aspinalls, Dawsons, etc. That kind-hearted man, Rector Renshaw, lived here in a corner house, with its door opening upon Newington-bridge. A little farther, on the opposite side, was the house of the famous John Foster, the most influential, as he assuredly was the cleverest, man of his day; the father of the generation who have lived and died amongst us, abused, every one of them, for their name, but admitted, all and each, to have been gifted men in their several callings and professions. Opposite to the house of Rector Renshaw was that of Harry Park, as we familiarly called him, the Abernethy or Astley Cooper of Liverpool; as a surgeon, we believe, second to no man of his day. At the very next door lived Dr. Brandreth, of whose eminence, or pre-eminence, as a physician, it is impossible to speak too highly. In all our wanderings over, and sojournings in, different parts of the world, we never remember to have met with a medical man whose standing was so thoroughly ascertained, admitted, and appreciated. And his position was as elevated in the social as in the medical world. There was no appeal against the fiats which Fashion issued from her seat in Bold-street. We now come to Slater-street, then only partially built upon. Here lived the Myers family, and here resided Mr. Tobin—at a much later period, Sir John.
In Seel-street was Mr. Perry, the first dentist of his day and locality; and next door to him lived the tremendous Mrs. Oates, the best instructress of small children in the rudiments of English whom the world has ever seen. She had the knack of measuring baby capacity, and of drawing out all that it contained, helped thereto, doubtless, by a concentrated essence of birch-rod-look which she constantly wore in school-hours, and which had “no mistake” written upon it in large letters. At all events, her name was celebrated at that day in all our public schools, as the best grounder and trainer of the young idea from whom they ever received recruits. But now we are in Duke-street, one of the most fashionable streets in the town at that remote period, and for some years afterwards. Here lived Mr. Whitehouse, and Mr. Peter Ellames. A little higher up resided a glorious old soul, Mr., afterwards Sir William Barton, as hearty a true Briton as ever walked on shoe-leather, and who had many experiences to tell of the West Indies in general, and Barbadoes in particular; and many also were the jokes tossed off at his expense. There used to be a nigger song quoted against him, extemporised by the black poets, it was said, on some occasion when he had lost a horse-race in Barbadoes. Some of the jingling rhymes we recollect ran thus:
“Massa Barton, Massa Barton, we
