and I am proud
to convey to your Majesty that the child in the old oak cradle was no
less a person than your Majesty's humble and obedient servant, Bill o'th'
Hoylus End, Poet and Philosopher to the plebians of Keighley, and who now
rejoices in the fiftieth year of your Majesty's reign that he has been
blessed with good health during that long period, having had at no time
occasion to call in a physician. John Barleycorn has been my medical
adviser, and when I begin to review the fifty years of your most
illustrious reign, from my birth, I feel grateful indeed, for great and
mighty men and nations have risen and fallen; but I am proud to think
that your Most Gracious Majesty and your humble servant have weathered
the storm, and I also can assure your Majesty that the lukewarm loyalty
of the upper ten is not a sample of people here, for during the latter
half of your Majesty's reign up to now prosperity has shone upon the once
crooked, old, mis-shapen town, for wealth has been accumulated to the
tune of millions, which I am sorry to inform your Majesty is in the hands
of those who mean to keep it. One portion of your Majesty's lukewarm
loyal subjects have the advancement of art and science so much on the
brain that it is feared they will go stark mad. I have also much
pleasure in informing your gracious Majesty that His Grace the Duke of
Devonshire has presented the people of Keighley with a plot of ground to
be called the Devonshire Park, which will be opened on the occasion of
your Majesty's Jubilee; also that Henry Isaac Butterfield, Esquire, of
bonny Cliffe Castle, has erected a noble-looking structure, to be called
the Jubilee Tower, which will be opened on the day of your Majesty's
Grand Jubilee, to commemorate your Majesty's glorious reign. This
gentleman is a native of Keighley, and fairly entitled to be knighted by
your gracious Majesty, seeing that he has done more to beautify the town
than all the rest. It has also been given out that the town has to be
honoured by a royal visit from your Majesty's grandson, Prince George.
But pray take a fool's advice, your Majesty, and don't let him come
unless he is able to pay his own expenses; for I can assure His Royal
Highness that this is the city of number oneism. Yet with the exception
of parting with the bawbees, I dare be sworn that your Majesty's subjects
in Keighley are the grand and genuine men of the shire, take them in art
and science, flood or field.