DISRAELI AND THE WAXWORKS

Evening Post, Volume CXXVII, Issue 17, 21 January 1939, Page 22

DISRAELI AND THE WAXWORKS

The enthusiasts wh vo have been proposing statues of Mr. Chamberlain and streets and hospital beds to be named after him, as a mark of appreciation for the man who brought "peace with honour" from Munich; might be well advised to consider the case of Tracy Turnerelli, who was so elated by Beaconsfield's success at the Berlin Congress that he> proposed to present him with a gold laurel wreath to be paid for by pennies subscribed by working men, says the "Manchester Guardian." It was calculated that the cost of each leaf would be about £5, representing the subscriptions of 1200 working men, and with the 1200 pennies were to be sent the names j and addresses of the donors. They rolled up in their thousands, and Turnerelli was encouraged to proceed by the Conservative Press, Conservative politicians, and some of the Conservative clergy. The Rev. Richard Butler strongly advocated that a most beautiful wreath of gold should encircle the brow of Benjamin Disraeli, "in whose career there was not one dishonouring blot." There came a fly in the ointment when "Punch" poked fun at the tribute and in a cartoon represented

Beaconsfield examining the wreath and commenting in this Jinglesque fashion: "Wreath? H'm! Interesting object! Fifty-two thousand eight hundred pennies! Gratifying tribute! Tracy Turnerelli! Remarkable name!!" But the wily statesman himself never moved, and when the wreath was made —20 ounces in weight, 22-carat gold, 46 leaves each bearing on the back the names of the towns which had sent or promised' subscriptions— well, he flatly refused to receive it. Turnerelli always hinted darkly that, if honour permitted, he could relate some awful things about this matter, but it wou.ld have been easier to get honey from a basilisk than State secrets from him. So the gold wreath, after being on view for a month at the Crystal Palace, and being inspected by the Prince of Wales, who said it would not "have discredited the hand of Benvenuto .Cellini," found a resting-place among Madame Tussaud's waxworks. Turnerelli himself did not see the humour of placing it there near the relics of Napoleon, to whom the French people presented a wreath, which he did receive. But a sense of humour was never TurnerellFs strong point.