Under this title The Western Times of 25th January 1845 published a correspondent's curious attempt at humour in the matter of the perceived shift towards the much feared Church of Rome of Henry Phillpotts, Bishop of Exeter. The passage is in the style of a Victorian child's first 'reader', hence the hyphens between the syllables.
"Har-ry Phill-pots of Ex-on was a sad naugh-ty lad. He did not wish to say his pray-ers right, and he was a bad boy in the Church.
"The Queen did tell him he must wear a gown, but he did not like to wear it. What a sad boy was he to try to cast off the gown which his Queen did tell him he must wear.
"Har-ry was like the dog in the man-ger. He did not want the gown him-self and he did not wish oth-ers to wear it; but if he does not take care, they say the Queen will make him give his gown to some good boy who will like to wear it, and she will al-so take away his big wig, of which he is so proud.
"Har-ry did shake a paw with a sly Pus-sey; but one day Pus-sey will put forth his sharp claw, and will scratch him, and will bite him too if he does not mind, for Pus-sey is ve-ry sly!!"
By Pus-sey, of course, is meant Edward Bouverie Pusey, a leader of the Tractarian Movement at Oxford, and his Puseyite followers.
The writer of the above piece had no reason to fear that Henry Phillpotts might lose his big wig. Phillpotts was, in fact, to be the longest serving English bishop since the fouteenth century, driving his many enemies mad by his continuance in office until 1869.
The Western Times and its correspondents, seem never to make up their minds how to spell Phillpotts. One suspects they only do it to annoy because they know it teases.
Dog in the man-ger: do young people still know their Aesop?
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