Читать книгу The Life & Work of Charles Bradlaugh - J. M. Robertson - Страница 23

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"KILL THE INFIDEL."

In the month of January, 1861, Mr. Stephen Bendall was charged by Mr. Nicholas Le Mesurier, a constable of St. Peter Port, Guernsey, with having upon several occasions in the month before distributed printed papers calculated to bring the Christian religion into contempt and ridicule. The Court sentenced Mr. Bendall to give bail in the sum of £20 not to distribute any such tracts during the space of twelve months, or in default to be imprisoned for a fortnight. That the sentence took so lenient a form was doubtless in some measure due to the enlightened remarks of one of the jurats, a Mr. Tupper, who warned his colleagues that they should be "very careful not to countenance persecution on the ground of religion, for if we entered upon that course we could not tell where we should stop." Whether he did not feel himself altogether strong enough to oppose the prevailing temper of the bench, or from whatever reason, Mr. Tupper did not propose an acquittal, but suggested the above bail, which the Court after some consultation accepted, with the alternative of a fortnight's imprisonment. The Queen's Procureur had asked that Mr. Bendall should be imprisoned for a fortnight, "three days in each week solitary and on bread and water, and afterwards to give security in the sum of £50 not to distribute any of the tracts during the next twelve months, or quit the island."

This being the state of affairs in the island of Guernsey as to the freedom of opinion, and, moreover, as some of the tracts distributed appear to have been written by Mr. Bradlaugh himself, it is not surprising to find the following notice amongst my father's lecture engagements in the next issue of the National Reformer:—

"February 26th, 27th, 28th—Guernsey. Specially to settle the question, Will the authorities put in force the laws against blasphemy?"

An advertisement was sent to the Guernsey Mail, but that paper not only ostentatiously declined to insert it, but thought fit to make a public declaration of its own virtue. The subject of the proposed "Infidel lectures" was to be an endeavour to prove that the Bible is not a revelation from an all-perfect Deity; and this the editor of the Guernsey Mail chose to construe as the admission of the existence of a God; and upon this glaringly false premise he built quite a series of astonishingly childish arguments in proof of the wickedness of Mr. Bradlaugh and Atheists generally. Then, apparently quite satisfied as to the effect of what he had written, he took it "for granted that, if the Assembly Rooms are really to be applied to Infidel purposes, no decent person, rich or poor, old or young, will give his countenance or notice their intention save to dissuade the unwary from lending an ear."

On the Sunday Mr. Bradlaugh was lecturing in Sheffield, but he left for London by the night train, and arrived at Guernsey on Tuesday morning about half-past eight. On the pier Mr. Bendall was awaiting him with some anxiety.

"His anxiety," Mr. Bradlaugh relates, "was partly occasioned by the knowledge that some preparations had been made to welcome me with a royal salute of rotten eggs. One Christian lady, I was credibly informed, had subscribed for the purpose of providing me with this savoury donation." In spite, however, of all rumours to the contrary, "the landing was effected without opposition, and I walked into Guernsey without even a word. Many eyes were directed towards me, and greater curiosity could scarcely have been evinced had I been a red-buttoned mandarin of a tritailed Pasha."[66]

My father had already thrown down the gauntlet by the circulation of a handbill addressed to the Procureur, to the clergy (especially of the Methodist New Connection, who had been particularly prominent in the proceedings against Mr. Bendall), and to the Guernsey public. In this handbill he stated his intention to lecture on the Bible in the Assembly Rooms, which had been engaged for the 27th and 28th for that purpose, and invited free and fair discussion upon his lecture. To this declaration of defiance he signed his name and gave his address in full. Mr. Bradlaugh's first visit was to the Assembly Rooms, for the proprietors had yielded to the virtuous displeasure of the Guernsey Mail and the bigoted section of the community, and had withdrawn from their contract without giving any reason. On Mr. Bradlaugh's application he was informed that the proprietors did not intend to give any reason. No printer would print bills, and no crier would make announcement of the tabooed lectures. These were small difficulties, however, for which my father was not altogether unprepared, and he had therefore with him bills already printed; he had the bills, it is true, but now came another difficulty—no bill poster would post them! "Under these circumstances," he tells us, "Mr. Bendall and myself sallied forth, armed with a pastepot, brush, and ladder, and by the aid of the moon succeeded in affixing our notices to the wall in a manner which would have done credit to a professional bill-poster." He then addressed letters to the prosecutors in Mr. Bendall's case; these included a Methodist minister, a local preacher, a missionary, and the Harbour Master, Captain Le Mesurier. He also sent letters to the Bailiff and the ten jurats of the island; and to these last he further sent three of his pamphlets.

What happened on the following days I am fortunately able to tell in Mr. Bradlaugh's own words, for he gave a vivid description of his adventures in the National Reformer. He wrote: "During the Wednesday the excitement increased. On the walls some one had chalked 'Down with the Infidles,' 'Away with the Infidles;' perhaps the writer thought that I was a species of musical instrument, or it may be a Guernsey fashion to spell infidel differently from ourselves. Two immense boards, on which we had affixed a prominent notice of the meeting, were carried off from the doors of the Hotel de l'Europe, and recaptured with some difficulty. Near the hour of the lecture the whole of the street was crowded with people, but the room was only about half full, the multitude being apparently afraid to enter. … Directly I began to speak the room filled, and was soon crowded to excess, as were the bottom of the stairs and the passage. Many had to retire unable to gain admittance. At the same time that I commenced my lecture a terrific uproar was initiated in the streets; yells, hootings, groanings were raised which would do credit even to ignorant Wigan Orangemen, and at last a battering was commenced against the window shutters; so terrible was the din that, after speaking for twenty minutes, I determined to endeavour to put an end to it, and asked the persons present to kindly keep their places in the room while I quelled the riot outside. Many entreated me not to go, assuring me that my personal safety would be endangered; but I thought it best to go, and I went out alone, and found to my disgust that a huge mob, many of whom were respectably dressed, were encouraging some lads to break in the shutters with stones. I walked deliberately forward, and the lads ran away from their work. One stone was thrown which passed near my forehead, and the whole mass of men, women, and children set up a tremendous cry, part groan, part shriek, part yell, which must have lasted at least three minutes without the slightest lull. Half deafened by the clamour, I respectfully bowed, and mentally calculated the effect of sea air in strengthening the lungs of those cowards, who actually fell back step by step as I walked alone towards them." Desisting at length from what seemed a futile attempt to quiet the noisy multitude, Mr. Bradlaugh returned to the lecture room and resumed his discourse. His attempt at securing peace without was not so wasted as it had at first seemed, for the noise grew less and less, until it ceased altogether. He lectured for an hour and a half, and then publicly distributed a hundred of the condemned tracts, challenging the island authorities to proceed against him. On going out he found the mob very threatening; they "followed me to my lodgings," he said, "hooting and yelling, and shouting 'Kill the Infidel!' 'Murder the Infidel!'"

By the next day the excitement had greatly increased; it was said that the quay porters had been incited to violence, and certainly several of them were found collected outside the Hotel de l'Europe well plied with drink. The narrow street in which the Hotel was situated was crowded by an infuriated mass of persons, and Mr. Bradlaugh had great difficulty in making his way to the lecture room. His audience was large, and composed of respectable persons, who listened quietly and attentively to his discourse. They were, however, only allowed to remain in peace for about twenty minutes, for at the end of that time the outside mob became ungovernable, and dashing in the plate glass doors, broke into the house, and for a few moments stopped the proceedings. "Several of those, who had been made drunk for the occasion," continued my father, "I had great difficulty in expelling from the room; and this difficulty was increased by the addition of half-a-dozen soldiers who, strange to say, had been provided with passes to enable them to take part in the disturbance. Notwithstanding, I persevered in my lecture for about half-an-hour longer, although the exertion required on my part to control the riotous assemblage was of no ordinary character. The bulk of the respectable persons seemed highly indignant at the treatment to which I was subjected, and begged me not to risk my life amongst the excited multitude outside. An attempt was now made to turn out the gas, and considerable damage was done to the chairs and forms. I determined despite all to brave the riot, although shouts of 'Kill the Infidel,' 'Pitch the Infidel into the sea,' were heard on every side. My size aided me; the mob were as cowardly as they were noisy; and none liked to be the first in the projected assault. The soldiery now seemed inclined to co-operate in the endeavour to offer violence, and the consequence might have been serious to all concerned had it not been for the shrewdness of Madame Laval, the proprietress of the hotel, who, finding it useless to oppose my determination to face the mob, coolly pretended to show me a better way out of the hotel, and ushered me into a dark room, and locked me up for a couple of hours until the excitement had subsided. On Friday morning I quitted the island by the boat for Southampton; the pier was crowded, and on my appearance a few began to hiss, but ceased the moment I walked towards them. When the boat began to start, the cowardly fellows (knowing that I could not then return), headed by and instigated thereto by Captain Le Mesurier, the Harbour Master, an old gentleman whose appearance should have bespoken better conduct, hissed and yelled with a persistence which would have done credit to a nobler cause."

The local press endorsed the conduct of the "indignant population" in their treatment of Mr. Bradlaugh by calling it "an act of natural justice," but the local authorities made no attempt at prosecution. In consequence of the damage done to the hall, the expenses were considerable, and receipts there were none; but as Mr. Bradlaugh wrote later on, this was only one of thirty-two lectures given in the first six months of the year 1861 in which he incurred loss in "extending Freethought propaganda into new districts."