from a half-dead man, it is true, but that he
did win it. Also, that he believed he had read "Rules for the Manual and
Platoon Exercises" to some purpose; moreover, that he was sure he could
write, for that he, the writer, had once written to Wellington, and had
received an answer from him; nay, the writer once went so far as to
strike a blow for Wellington; for the last time he used his fists was
upon a Radical sub-editor, who was mobbing Wellington in the street, from
behind a rank of grimy fellows; but though the writer spoke up for
Wellington to a certain extent when he was shamefully underrated, and
once struck a blow for him when he was about being hustled, he is not
going to join in the loathsome sycophantic nonsense which it has been the
fashion to use with respect to Wellington these last twenty years. Now
what have those years been to England? Why, the years of
ultra-gentility, everybody in England having gone gentility mad during
the last twenty years, and no people more so than your pseudo-Radicals.
Wellington was turned out, and your Whigs and Radicals got in, and then
commenced the period of ultra-gentility in England. The Whigs and
Radicals only hated Wellington as long as the patronage of the country
was in his hands, none of which they were tolerably sure he would bestow
on them; but no sooner did they get it into their own, than they
forthwith became admirers of Wellington. And why? Because he was a
duke, petted at Windsor and by foreign princes, and a very genteel
personage. Formerly many of your Whigs and Radicals had scarcely a
decent coat on their backs; but now the plunder of the country was at
their disposal, and they had as good a chance of being genteel as any
people. So they were willing to worship Wellington because he was very
genteel, and could not keep the plunder of the country out of their
hands. And Wellington has been worshipped, and prettily so, during the
last fifteen or twenty years. He is now a noble, fine-hearted creature;
the greatest general the world ever produced; the bravest of men;
and--and--mercy upon us! the greatest of military writers! Now the
present writer will not join in such sycophancy. As he was not afraid to
take the part of Wellington when he was scurvily used by all parties, and
when it was dangerous to take his part, so he is not afraid to speak the
naked truth about Wellington in these days, when it is dangerous to say
anything about him but what is