| Citation |
VGW(HU.768.110
22 Sep 1768:13 (905)
Extract of a letter from Berwick, June 28. The 23d instant,
the day appointed for the celebration of his Majesty's birth
day, was observed here with more general demonstrations of
joy than ever known on the like occasion. After a discharge
of the artillery round the fortifications, nine companies of
the Royal Scotch were drawn up on the parade, and fired
three vollies; after which the King, and several other
toasts were drank, with three cheers, and the glasses thrown
in the air, while the military band of music played
Britannia up and down the parade.
The principal gentlemen, and the magistrates ordered
several hogsheads of beer to be distributed among the
populace, and the windows to be illuminated; and 'Wilkes and
Liberty, ' rung from every quarter. The assembly in the
evening was numerous and brilliant, and it was impossible
but that every gentleman there, even the professed enemies
of Mr. Wilkes, must have felt in himself an extraordinary
elevation, to behold in the dress of the ladies a most
uncommon attachment to Wilkes and Liberty: Their breast-
knots, and cockades on their heads, were exactly thrown into
the fugures 45; their foreheads were adorned with Wilkes and
Liberty in golden letters; and from their heads behind hung
an inverted boot and thistle.
These designations of Liberty, and her first rate son,
gave such an infatuating and irresistible power to their
charms, that when the toast of Wilkes and Liberty, was
proposed by a particular lady, the Scotch gentlemen in
general could not possible avoid showing their approbation
by an easy and smiling taciturnity; and the same infatuation
unavoidably led them to swallow, in the sweet and
irresistible vehicle of love, that bitter pill of Forty-
five.
Thus our Berwick ladies, even on the borders of Scotland,
have the courage and resolution, to make the most public
declaration of their attachment to Mr. Wilkes, and to the
celebrated number 45.
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