Chapter XIII

Some Account Of Eatanswill; Of The State Of Parties Therein; And

Of The Election Of A Member To Serve In Parliament For That

Ancient, Loyal, And Patriotic Borough

We will frankly acknowledge that, up to the period of our being first

immersed in the voluminous papers of the Pickwick Club, we had

never heard of Eatanswill; we will with equal candour admit that we

have in vain searched for proof of the actual existence of such a place

at the present day. Knowing the deep reliance to be placed on every

note and statement of Mr Pickwick's, and not presuming to set up our

recollection against the recorded declarations of that great man, we

have consulted every authority, bearing upon the subject, to which we

could possibly refer. We have traced every name in schedules A and B,

without meeting with that of Eatanswill; we have minutely examined

every corner of the pocket county maps issued for the benefit of

society by our distinguished publishers, and the same result has

attended our investigation. We are therefore led to believe that Mr

Pickwick, with that anxious desire to abstain from giving offence to

any, and with those delicate feelings for which all who knew him well

know he was so eminently remarkable, purposely substituted a

fictitious designation, for the real name of the place in which his

observations were made. We are confirmed in this belief by a little

circumstance, apparently slight and trivial in itself, but when

considered in this point of view, not undeserving of notice. In Mr

Pickwick's note-book, we can just trace an entry of the fact, that the

places of himself and followers were booked by the Norwich coach; but

this entry was afterwards lined through, as if for the purpose of

concealing even the direction in which the borough is situated. We will

not, therefore, hazard a guess upon the subject, but will at once

proceed with this history, content with the materials which its

characters have provided for us.

It appears, then, that the Eatanswill people, like the people of many

other small towns, considered themselves of the utmost and most

mighty importance, and that every man in Eatanswill, conscious of

the weight that attached to his example, felt himself bound to unite,

heart and soul, with one of the two great parties that divided the town

the Blues and the Buffs. Now the Blues lost no opportunity of

opposing the Buffs, and the Buffs lost no opportunity of opposing the

Blues; and the consequence was, that whenever the Buffs and Blues

met together at public meeting, town-hall, fair, or market, disputes

and high words arose between them. With these dissensions it is

almost superfluous to say that everything in Eatanswill was made a

party question. If the Buffs proposed to new skylight the market-place,

the Blues got up public meetings, and denounced the proceeding; if

the Blues proposed the erection of an additional pump in the High

The Pickwick Papers