3-052-526 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The General Election: canvassing - old style, 1880. 'The "Old Style of Canvassing," which was frequently practised in those days when George or William, instead of our good Queen Victoria, reigned as King over this Constitutional realm, is depicted in a very Pickwickian sketch...we seem to recognise the trim figure of Mr. Perker, attorney-at-law, or one of the firm of Dodson and Fogg, with two demure satellites from a London office, transacting summary negotiations at the portal of that fortress of popular liberties, a freeborn Englishman's house and "castle." There is a golden, if not silver, key that wiII promptly open the sturdy door of political independence and seclusion to the emissaries of a wealthy candidate. "What shall we say, my dear Sir?" the wily tempter asks, with a cunning wink at the bluff and burly object of his pecuniary seductions. "We must consider your trouble and loss of time, of course...Shall we make it ten - or say, fifteen - or come now, I should say twenty?" So many of King George's yellow guineas, with the dragon and the sainted knight-errant thereon stamped, will presently drop from a purse into the country voter's ample and capacious palm, and will be silently transferred to the deep pocket of his drab breeches'. From "Illustrated London News", 1880.