3-052-528 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The General Election: at the Holborn Townhall, 1880. 'As for popular meetings and platform speeches, to discuss or to expound the views of any political party, their effect is generally wholesome in awakening the spirit and intelligence of the less thoughtful minds, and in provoking a desire for real information. But there is apt to be a grotesque comicality in some aspects of these assemblies, notwithstanding the earnestness with which the well-meaning orators devote themselves energetically to the task of persuasion, in the face of a mixed multitude, part of which may be stupidly inattentive, part fiercely hostile, from some passionate prejudice, to the cause for which the speakers are pleading. The scene at the Holborn Townhall, which is the subject of our Illustration, affords a graphic example of this remark'. From "Illustrated London News", 1880.