Mercer Chronicle

THE MERCER CHRONICLE. 23
Leading the civil and religious van,
They have compassed centuries in a glorious span ;
To genuine Eeform he still is friend,
But will have nought the Three Estates to rend.
Licence for liberty he "will not mistake !
Nor ruin all but for a trader's sake ! 62
representative of that family, Earl Russell, is called on to play a great
part at a critical juncture. Once the barons, in the History of England
were the aggressors against liberty ; then they secured for us the Magka
Charta ; secondly, the monarch, ill advised by a Churchman, mis-
understood his position in the middle of the 17th century : now it is a
monied borough aristocracy, who would pack our voters, snub their clerks
and warehousemen, give officers to our Army and Navy, prevent men
rising from the ranks, calling them "common" soldiers, sacrifice our
national honour, and shirk cdl respoyisibility, as was pretty well seen in
the Crimean panic, when it was naively observed that our regimental
system was excellent, but our generals so-so ; as if general officers were
not formed in regiments ! the drift being, that general officers are
" aristocrats " or Conservatives, therefore they were so-so ! But when,
in regiments, to be fond of one's profession or to talk of its duties is
termed " talking shop," and therefore is a practice as studiously avoided
as it is by the carpenter who " is out for the day," because he is in his
Sunday attire, as it is styled in London, how can officers become generals 1
And as the nobles do not keep shops, we must look elsewhere for this
word, for this hindrance to military proficiency !
63 A trader's sake. — Now the traders themselves being judges, we
leave it to them if all things are to be balanced by the tables of money
or avoirdupois weight ; are there not higher motives of religion,
loyalty, honour, gallantry and patriotism, which never can be placed in
such scales 1 We appeal to the conscientious trader, who with his daily
opportunities still recollects that an honest man is God's noblest
work ; but what account should we take of him, whose fair price is
according to his opportunity ! to the knowing purchaser the price ; to
the simple more ! hence it is that Trade comes to have a bad smell in
the nostrils of a chivalrous man ; and but too many tradesmen confirm
this feeling by being ashamed of the shop, particularly when "out
for the day /" in their Sunday clothes. Ashamed of the shop, indeed !
• I am proud of my profession in the Army, though some snobs of the
Cox and Box tribe have attempted in my time to sneer down " the
soldier" which name, however, loyal, true, and knightly men like Sir
Sidney Cotton, K.C.B., have made respectable : but were I a shoe-
maker, I should not, I trust, be above my calling ; I should be proud of
it, and endeavour to make my name known by my shoes never pinching