And so throughout the centuries. Scarce a war happened but Northampton benefited by the increased demand for shoe-leather. Old Fuller in the long ago declared that it “may be said to stand chiefly on other men’s legs,” and there is probably a deep-seated conviction in the minds of the townsfolk that the state of the boot-and-shoe trade is a more sure index of the prosperity of the nation than that of the iron and shipbuilding trades, usually regarded as the chief indicators of the national welfare.
This conviction of the prime importance of foot-gear has in its time led to some quaint doings; notably when Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort came through the town in 1844, when the Mayor gave the Prince—who did not want them—a pair of boots. I suspect there have been many thousands of wayfarers through the town who _did_ sorely want a pair, and never had the offer.
[Illustration: NORTHAMPTON: MARKET PLACE AND ALL SAINTs’ CHURCH.]
Thousands of pairs of mud-boots were despatched hence to the Army in the Crimea; but whence came the brown paper and cardboard boots supplied by contractors to our poor fellows in that mismanaged campaign? Not from Northampton, I trust.
Of the Northampton Parliamentary elections, famed in the long ago for the bitterness with which they were fought, none are more celebrated than the “great spendthrift election,” waged in 1761 between my lords Northampton, Spencer, and Halifax, for the privilege of nominating a member. The enormous expenses incurred were not the most remarkable thing about this contest, although they were unprecedented; nor was the fourteen days’ duration of the poll a thing unheard of. The really startling feature was the heaviness of that poll. Northampton had not only voted its full strength of 930 electors, but 217 over. A petition followed, and was settled, in the sporting manner of the age, by a toss. Lord Spencer won, and nominated his man—who resided in India.
The old churches of Northampton are very fine, and highly interesting in their several ways. There are four of them: St. Peter’s, St. Giles’s, Holy Sepulchre, and All Saints’. It seems strange, considering how ancient is the distinctive trade, that there is no church dedicated to St. Crispin, the patron saint of bootmakers and cobblers. Of all these churches that of the Holy Sepulchre is the most archæologically interesting; but to most people it is the great church of All Saints, in the Market Square, that stands for Northampton. And rightly so, for it is not merely in the centre of the town, but in a most striking and emphatic position; it is also the church selected by the Corporation for its state attendance of Divine worship, as the fine Mayor’s Chair in it—inscribed “Anno Majoratus 2ᵈᵒ Ricardi White, Anno Dom. 1680”—proves; and its curious architectural appearance gives to Northampton a distinct personality among English towns. This is in its present form no mediæval building, but a very remarkable structure of the time of Charles the Second, as we may readily perceive from the statue of him, clad in flowing wig and Roman toga, that surmounts the pillared west front.