London Club Life. John Timbs

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СКАЧАТЬ Joshua Reynolds, Garrick and Hume, Horace Walpole, Gibbon, and Sheridan and Wilberforce. Lord March, afterwards Duke of Queensberry, was one of its notorieties—"the old Q., whom many now living can remember, with his fixed eye and cadaverous face, watching the flow of the human tide past his bow-window in Pall Mall."—National Review, 1857. [This is hardly correct as to locality, since the Club left Pall Mall in 1778, and a reminiscent must be more than 80 years of age.] Among Selwyn's correspondents are Gilly Williams, Hare, Fitzpatrick, the Townshends, Burgoyne, Storer, and Lord Carlisle. R. Tickell, in "Lines from the Hon. Charles Fox to the Hon. John Townshend cruising," thus describes the welcome that awaits Townshend, and the gay life of the Club:—

      "Soon as to Brookes's thence thy footsteps bend,

       What gratulations thy approach attend!

       See Gibbon tap his box; auspicious sign,

       That classic compliment and evil combine.

       See Beauclerk's cheek a tinge of red surprise,

       And friendship gives what cruel health denies.

       Important Townshend! what can thee withstand?

       The ling'ring black-ball lags in Boothby's hand.

       E'en Draper checks the sentimental sigh;

       And Smith, without an oath, suspends the die."

      Mr. Wilberforce has thus recorded his first appearance at Brookes's: "Hardly knowing any one, I joined, from mere shyness, in play at the faro-tables, where George Selwyn kept bank. A friend, who knew my inexperience, and regarded me as a victim decked out for sacrifice, called to me, 'What, Wilberforce, is that you?' Selwyn quite resented the interference, and, turning to him, said, in his most expressive tone, 'Oh, Sir, don't interrupt Mr. Wilberforce; he could not be better employed!'"

      The Prince of Wales, one day at Brookes's, expatiating on that beautiful but far-fetched idea of Dr. Darwin's, that the reason of the bosom of a beautiful woman being the object of such exquisite delight for a man to look upon, arises from the first pleasurable sensations of warmth, sustenance, and repose, which he derives therefrom in his infancy; Sheridan replied, "Truly hath it been said, that there is only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous. All children who are brought up by hand must derive their pleasurable sensations from a very different source; yet I believe no one ever heard of any such, when arrived at manhood, evincing any very rapturous or amatory emotions at the sight of a wooden spoon." This clever exposure of an ingenious absurdity shows the folly of taking for granted every opinion which may be broached under the sanction of a popular name.

      The conversation at Brookes's, one day, turning on Lord Henry Petty's projected tax upon iron, one member said, that as there was so much opposition to it, it would be better to raise the proposed sum upon coals. "Hold! my dear fellow," said Sheridan, "that would be out of the frying pan into the fire, with a vengeance."

      Mr. Whitbread, one evening at Brookes's, talked loudly and largely against the Ministers for laying what was called the war tax upon malt: every one present concurred with him in opinion, but Sheridan could not resist the gratification of a hit at the brewer himself. He wrote with his pencil upon the back of a letter the following lines, which he handed to Mr. Whitbread, across the table:—

      "They've raised the price of table drink;

       What is the reason, do you think?

       The tax on malt's the cause I hear— But what has malt to do with beer?"

      Looking through a Number of the Quarterly Review, one day, at Brookes's, soon after its first appearance, Sheridan said, in reply to a gentleman who observed that the editor, Mr. Gifford, had boasted of the power of conferring and distributing literary reputation; "Very likely; and in the present instance I think he has done it so profusely as to have left none for himself."

      Sir Philip Francis was the convivial companion of Fox, and during the short administration of that statesman was made a Knight of the Bath. One evening, Roger Wilbraham came up to a whist-table at Brookes's, where Sir Philip, who for the first time wore the ribbon of the Order, was engaged in a rubber, and thus accosted him. Laying hold of the ribbon and examining it for some time, he said: "So, this is the way they have rewarded you at last: they have given you a little bit of red ribbon for your services, Sir Philip, have they? A pretty bit of red ribbon to hang about your neck; and that satisfies you, does it? Now, I wonder what I shall have.—What do you think they will give me, Sir Philip?"

      The newly-made Knight, who had twenty-five guineas depending on the rubber, and who was not very well pleased at the interruption, suddenly turned round, and looking at him fiercely, exclaimed, "A halter, and be d—d to you!"

      George III. invariably evinced a strong aversion to Fox, the secret of which it is easy to understand. His son, the Prince of Wales, threw himself into the arms of Fox, and this in the most undisguised manner. Fox lodged in St. James's-street, and as soon as he rose, which was very late, had a levee of his followers, and of the members of the gaming club, at Brookes's, all his disciples. His bristly black person, and shagged breast quite open, and rarely purified by any ablutions, was wrapped in a foul linen night-gown, and his bushy hair dishevelled. In these cynic weeds, and with epicurean good-humour, did he dictate his politics, and in this school did the heir of the Crown attend his lessons, and imbibe them.

      Fox's love of play was desperate. A few evenings before he moved the repeal of the Marriage Act, in February, 1772, he had been at Brompton on two errands: one to consult Justice Fielding on the penal laws; the other to borrow ten thousand pounds, which he brought to town at the hazard of being robbed. Fox played admirably both at whist and piquet; with such skill, indeed, that by the general admission of Brookes's Club, he might have made four thousand pounds a year, as they calculated, at those games, if he could have confined himself to them. But his misfortune arose from playing games at chance, particularly at Faro. After eating and drinking plentifully, he sat down to the Faro table, and inevitably rose a loser. Once, indeed, and once only, he won about eight thousand pounds in the course of a single evening. Part of the money he paid away to his creditors, and the remainder he lost almost immediately. Before he attained his thirtieth year, he had completely dissipated everything that he could either command, or could procure by the most ruinous expedients. He had even undergone, at times, many of the severest privations annexed to the vicissitudes that mark a gamester's progress; frequently wanting money to defray the common daily wants of the most pressing nature. Topham Beauclerc, who lived much in Fox's society, affirmed, that no man could form an idea of the extremities to which he had been driven in order to raise money, after losing his last guinea at the Faro table. He was reduced for successive days to such distress, as to borrow money from the waiters of Brookes's. The very chairmen, whom he was unable to pay, used to dun him for their arrears. In 1781, he might be considered as an extinct volcano, for the pecuniary aliment that had fed the flame was long consumed. Yet he then occupied a house or lodgings in St. James's-street close to Brookes's, where he passed almost every hour which was not devoted to the House of Commons. Brookes's was then the rallying point or rendezvous of the Opposition; where, while faro, whist, and supper prolonged the night, the principal members of the Minority in both Houses met, in order to compare their information, or to concert and mature their parliamentary measures. Great sums were then borrowed of Jews at exorbitant premiums. Fox called his outward room, where the Jews waited till he rose, the Jerusalem Chamber. His brother Stephen was enormously fat; George Selwyn said he was in the right to deal with Shylocks, as he could give them pounds of flesh.

      When Fox lodged with his friend Fitzpatrick, at Mackie's, some one remarked that two such inmates would be the ruin of Mackie, the oilman; "No," said George Selwyn; "so far from ruining him, they will make poor Mackie's fortune; for he will have the credit of having the finest pickles in СКАЧАТЬ