The Creevey Papers
Thomas Creevey to Elizabeth Ord, 2 November 1834
“York, Nov. 2, 1834.
“Oh! Barry, my
dear,† your mail is the genuine mode of travelling for us single people,
provided it is not that stupid heavy Gloucester one. We were the last mail out
of Post Office Yard last night—½ past 8, and such a load of letters, too,
and bags as I never beheld—nevertheless I was here, 198 miles, by a
quarter before five this evening, was dressed by six, and have just finished my
excellent boiled fowl and bacon.‡ . . . I am so enamoured of mail
travelling that
* The Earl of
Durham. † Mr.
Creevey usually addressed Miss
Ord as Bessy, but sometimes as
Barry. ‡ Nimrod writes of this Edinburgh mail as the
ne plus ultra of road
work at any time. “It runs the distance, 400 miles, in a
little over 40 hours, and we may set our watches by it any point of
her journey. Stoppages included, this approaches eleven miles in
the hour, and much the greater part of it by lamplight.”
The time of the Flying Scotsman on the Great Northern Railway for this
journey is now 8 hours and 25 minutes; and she keeps
it. |
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| 292 | THE CREEVEY PAPERS | [Ch. XII. |
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I mean to stay here to-morrow, to play with the Minister,
to have an early dinner and be off with the Edinbro mail of to-morrow about
five, and so get to Alnwick about six on Tuesday morning. . . . I have been
thinking much of the belligerents Lambton
and Brougham on my way down, and I think
the former has completely cut his own throat by his speech at the Glasgow
dinner, and has given Beelzebub a horse to ride which,
with his jockeyship, will carry him thro’. It is not a year since this
hair-brained Lambton claimed for himself at his Gateshead
dinner the exclusive merit of originating the general Reform Bill; and now,
forsooth, he pledges himself to his new allies, the Glasgow operatives, and to
all other operatives, that he will have nothing short of household suffrage,
&c., &c., which is, of course, a repeal of the present Reform Act, of
which six months ago he was so proud. Beelzebub may say
now, when he is accused of his gratuitous declaration against going on too
quickly with Reform:—‘Why, I knew at the time more than you all
put together. I knew that a daring measure was concocting to destroy all
our labours, and put the people en
masse against the property of the country, and I knew
that Lord Durham was to lead this crew. With this
conviction on my mind, could I do less than put the country on its guard
against the new-fangled reform?’ . . .
Durham’s is a truly daring measure, and he has
nothing left but to pit the strength of the Radicals—himself at their
head—against the property and good sense of the country; and I presume
(for there is no telling till one sees) that he will be beat dead
hollow.”
Charles James Apperley [Nimrod] (1778-1843)
Writer for the
Sporting Magazine who in 1830 emigrated to France
to avoid paying his debts; he published
Hunting Reminiscences
(1843).
Henry Peter Brougham, first baron Brougham and Vaux (1778-1868)
Educated at Edinburgh University, he was a founder of the
Edinburgh
Review in which he chastised Byron's
Hours of Idleness; he
defended Queen Caroline in her trial for adultery (1820), established the London University
(1828), and was appointed lord chancellor (1830).
Thomas Creevey (1768-1838)
Whig politician aligned with Charles James Fox and Henry Brougham; he was MP for Thetford
(1802-06, 1807-18) Appleby (1820-26) and Downton (1831-32). He was convicted of libel in
1813.
Elizabeth Ord (1789-1854 c.)
Of Rivenhall in Essex, the daughter of William Ord of Fenham and younger sister of
William Ord MP (1781-1855); she was the step-daughter and correspondent of Thomas Creevy.
Her will was made and proved in 1854.
