Chapter XV: Act III (10)

Moreover there was the penniless and threadbare student Bonwicke; and the well-paid Bernard, tutor to the Dukes of Grafton and Northumberland, sons of Charles II. and the Duchess of Cleveland; but for his employers he was too pure and grave a man. And there was Wells, the Nonconformist and, sad blot in the school escutcheon, Titus Oates, who was also a nonconformist to morality and religion; and Needler, fit name for pupil of such house, and who wrote in defence of the Trinity when half England had more delight in the argument than the end for which the argument was raised. Several others of the pupils, now grown men, in the reign of James II., were hanging over their pulpits, half Romanists, half Reformers. Like the tomb of the old prelate at Canterbury, they were neither in the Church nor out of it, but a little of both. Indeed many of these men were singularly constituted; and we may cite as an instance the case of young Dawes, who began his poetical career by composing a poem, which I should not like to read, entitled the ‘Anatomy of Atheism.’ Nevertheless Merchant Tailors’ School boasted of Dawes, and of Boulter and Wilcox, whose election to Magdalen was called by Dr. Hough, the President, the “Golden Election,” as the Charterhouse boasted of Addison. The “small change” here hardly represented the value of the larger piece.

Sayer and Oliver, two fellow-pupils of the school, were successive Archdeacons of Surrey; Joshua Barnes and Peter Heylin were also of the “Table” or the “Bench;” and Wright, Vicar of Okeham, was of the latter, and not less famed for his steady refusal of all preferment. Like ‘Silver Penny,’ so named for his pure eloquence, though it might have been also for his liberality, and who has made so exquisite a restoration of Mongeham Church, near Deal, he loved the temple of which he was the priest too well to wish to change his office. Then there were botanical Sherrard; Torriano, of Italian blood; Dee, descended from that Dr. Dee who fooled Elizabeth so “consumedly;” and William Bridge, himself the son of a tailor and draper, and who contributed a Threnodia to the cairn of melodious mourning heaped upon the dead body of William the Third.

Merchant Tailors’ had peculiar joy in the accession of Anne, for it was through one of the pupils that the succession of this sovereign lady was undisputed. Crowther had married her mother, Anne Hyde, to the Duke of York; and he did this so cautiously and entirely according to law, with ample proof to support it, that James strove in vain to procure an annulling of the marriage, and Merchant Tailors’ looked on the position of the female monarch as one which had been achieved for her by one of the popular scholars of the house. It was expected that she would have shown her royal gratitude by conferring the Bishopric of Lincoln on little Doctor Dawes, another scholar; but Dawes preached unpalatable truths to her, and Anne would not move him from an honorary chaplaincy. “You have lost a bishopric by your preaching,” said a good-natured friend to him. “I do not know how that may be,” said Dawes, “but I certainly never mean to try to gain one by preaching.” Divinely well said, O doughty Dawes! You well deserved what you afterwards attained, the See of Chester.

Among the pupils who _were_ raised to the Bench, Mews, of Winchester, was perhaps as remarkable as any. His death certainly was so. He was subject to fainting fits, from which he was used to recover by smelling hartshorn. He was once in conversation with a clerical friend, when he was suddenly attacked by one of these fits. He was speechless, but he pointed to the bottle of hartshorn on his table. The friend seized the bottle, and, opening the prelate’s mouth, poured the whole of the contents down his throat, by which the bishop was suffocated. Notwithstanding this neat achievement, the zealous clerical friend did not succeed to the vacant see.

I could name many more “prelates” and “parsons,” who were all good men and true, and who did honour to the establishment wherein they had received their earlier education; but the glory of all these pales before the brighter reputation of Ambrose Bonwicke, that “pattern for a student,” who was ever so mild, save when he helped his father, the schoolmaster, to flog the boys; so loyal, save when he refused to read the prayer for the prosperity of the House of Hanover; and so wise, save when, in honour of religion, he brought on death by his austerities. He lacked no eulogists after his decease; and it is suggestive as to what was considered early rising in the days of the first George, when we find young Bonwicke praised for getting up at half-past six! Merchant Tailors’ School was prouder of him than it ever was of the greatly intellectual Lowth. On the other hand, it was ashamed of Tooley, of St. John’s, who edited Tully’s ‘Offices,’ for the good reason that he was a namesake of the author; and this, his poor qualification, was also his solitary one. He effected one other deed,—the seducing of Amhurst to such bad ways, that the latter ex-alumnus of Merchant Tailors’ was expelled the University. Amhurst, in a preface to his poems, declared that he was so punished because he was said to “love foreign turnips and Presbyterian bishops; and to believe that steeples and organs were not necessary to salvation.”

Amhurst was among the “odd fellows” of the school. So was Leigh, who died at Gravelines, and whom the Roman Catholics proved to have died in their faith, by burying him within the church in that lively locality. Duncan Dee belongs rather to the bold than the odd fellows. He will ever be remembered as the intrepid defender of Sacheverel. Among the worthiest fellows was Wheatly, for ever famous for his immortal illustration of the Book of Common Prayer. Among the stout-hearted fellows was that paradoxical Dr. Byrom, of short-hand notoriety, who was loved for his wit and worth, and whose diary has lately been published by the Chetham Society. He was the son of a linendraper; married for love; struggled for life at his leisure; earned a decent maintenance by teaching and practising the system of short-hand which he had invented; spent his last days in well-earned ease; and is famous for his epigrammatic epitaph on that irregular and chemical genius and jolly fellow, Dr. Byfield, who invented the _sal volatile oleosum_, and who was thus celebrated by Byrom over a flask at the Rainbow:—

“Hic jacet Dr. Byfield, diu volatilis, tandem fixus!”

I may add, as being worthy to be classed among the clever fellows, Derham, whose ability was honoured by a sneer from Voltaire; and finally, among the audacious fellows was Zinzano, a conscientious clergyman, who thought to make Milton be forgotten by writing “an entirely new poem entitled ‘Paradise Regained,’” which turned out to be a treatise on the art of gardening! But the pupil whose name conferred most glory (so it is alleged) upon the records of the school during the Georgian days, was Clive,—that young hero who began by climbing church-spouts, and ended so miserably after he had added a wide empire to our little kingdom. If the celebrated Cline, another “Merchant Tailor,” killed more men in the practice of his profession, Clive, who was by no means contemptible as a slayer of legions, added millions of living subjects to our imperial sway. The only pupil who has been “distinguished from the crowd by being remembered to his infamy,” is Luke Milbourne, the antagonist of Dryden.

It has been said that Dr. South was a pupil of Merchant Tailors’, but this is not the case. He was however appointed chaplain to the Company; and he showed how he appreciated the honour, by taking for the text of his inauguration sermon the words, “A _remnant_ shall be saved!”

The greater portion of the men of whom the Merchant Tailors are proud, are men who made themselves, so to speak, and were not indebted in any way for fortune to their tailors. There was another class of men however, of whom the contrary may rather be said,—men who assumed the poor vocation of the beau, and found it a bankrupt calling. They have existed in all ages, and we will go back to those of old times. _Seniores priores._

Chapters on Beaux.

THE BEAUX OF THE OLDEN TIME.

“Le Beau ne plaît qu’un jour, si le Beau n’est utile.”—ST. LAMBERT.

Dress, like all other things, has been amply used and abused in all ages; but there is this to be said for man, that he is the only animal born without being provided with a necessary costume. This shows that he is a migratory animal; and if he be not naturally covered so as to suit all climates and himself, he has reason given him to meet all exigencies, and it is only a pity that he exhibits so little taste in the application of it. His storehouse, or rough wardrobe, is in the vegetable and animal kingdom; and plants die that man may live, and animals are skinned that the lord of creation may be covered.

The passion for fine dressing commenced undoubtedly with the ladies. When the Tyrian Alcides was one night loitering by the sea-side, his arm encircling one of those nymphs whom demigods and boatswains’ mates find in every port, and their eyes, when not looking into each other, were fixed on the shadowy splendour of the western star, his dog, a lank and hungry hound, came upon a shell, which he immediately began crunching. Thereupon there issued a liquid from the expiring fish within, so exquisite in colour that it attracted the eyes of the lady, who immediately declared that never again should she know peace of mind until she had a dress of that self-same hue. She bade the hero never to appear in her presence again until the garment was procured; and poor Hercules, who appears to have had as much perplexity about ladies’ petticoats as lions’ hides, was sadly puzzled before he and an eminent firm succeeded in procuring a dye which produced a garment of the hue required, and would have made the fortune of the discoverers, had they not been accustomed to the same sort of extravagances which make bankrupts of London tradesmen. In spite of this, the Tyrian purple long held on Fashion’s throne an undisputed sway; and no beau of old appeared in the world without a mantle of this colour hanging from his ivory shoulders. Agesilaus was one of this fashion-determining class; but unlike modern followers of the philosophy of the mode, he turned his ideas of dress to good account. For instance, when he was combating in Pontus against the barbarians, as the finely-clad and tender-hearted gentlemen there were called by their enemies, Agesilaus saw that they were most superbly attired, but that they also were very delicate of body. He accordingly gave orders that all the captains should be brought in naked, and be sold by the public crier; but that their garments should be sold separately. And this he did that the allies might know that they had to fight for rich spoils with a poor enemy, and so might rush to the attack with greater ardour. He had the picking of the spoil for his own wardrobe.

Alexander and his friends were probably the best-dressed men of all the Greeks at any period. Of one of these friends, Agnon, it is said he wore gold nails in both his slippers and sandals,—a piece of pride which was like that of the English farmer during the late war, who went to a market-dinner in a coat garnished with gold buttons. The vanity of the farmer was wounded at finding that they attracted no notice; and he clumsily tried to feed his pride and win observation by remarking, that “it certainly weer very warm work to wear goold buttons in the dog-days!”

Alexander of course slept on a couch of gold. Great Ammon’s son deserved no less a bed; but I can hardly credit the assertion that the sovereign’s tent contained a hundred such beds, and that the tent itself was supported by fifty columns of gold. The beds however may not have been for one individual’s use, and the tent was as vast as a barracks: the couches may therefore have been for the general officers. Five hundred Persians kept guard therein. These were the _Melophores_, the “apple-bearers,” who carried a golden apple on the points of their lances, and who were the admiration of all the maid-servants of the district, attired as the Melophores were in uniforms of purple and yellow. These were surpassed by the thousand archers, in their mantles of flame-colour, violet, or celestial blue. These were irresistible; the ladies at least said so, if the enemy did _not_; but even they achieved fewer conquests (I allude less to the field than the bower) than the five hundred Macedonian Argyraspides, the corps of “silver bucklers,” behind whose shields however beat hearts more easily reached by the feathered shafts of Dan Cupido than by the javelins of the foe.

The purple-robed guard of Alexander was his chosen troop, his _cent-garde_, charged with watching over his personal safety, and seeing that he got safely to bed when his divinity was exceedingly drunk. They were terrible coxcombs, were these guards, and would condescend to the folly of flinging eggs at the passers-by, as though they knew no better than military gentlemen returning from Epsom, or a wrathful curate of the district of St. Barnabas pelting an anti-puseyite. These men cared little whether Alexander were a god or not, but they had a firmly fixed idea that their tailor had a family claim upon Olympus.

But what were these to Alcisthenes the Sybarite, who has been immortalized by Aristotle? This rather fast individual had a coat of such magnificent material,—the coat worn by Prince Esterhazy, and which that magnate never put on without losing I really _do not_ know how many hundred pounds’ worth of pearls and diamonds, was, in comparison, a coat for the Sybarite’s valet,—Alcisthenes had a habit, I say, of such richness, that, on the day of the festival of Juno, it was exposed on Mount Lacinium, to the veneration of the crowds who annually repaired thither from all parts of Italy. It became the most attractive feature of the festival; and the shrines were passed by, that the pilgrims might fall into ecstasy in presence of Alcisthenes’ coat. It subsequently fell into the hands of old Dionysius,—a Jew in his way, as we all know,—and he sold it for one hundred and twenty talents to the Carthaginians: it was the highest price ever realized for such a garment.

But it was not the only coat exalted, like the serpent of old, to win insane worship from imbecile idolators. Gibbon smiles with warrantable contempt upon the Roman priests who, behind the altar, were preparing miracles wherewith to astound the people. A deeper contempt attaches to the several priests who compelled two poor honest tailors, or weavers rather, to produce the duplicate coats, without a seam, each warranted to have been worn by the Great Victim ere He passed to Calvary, and before each of which, as the only one genuine, thousands, ay millions, have flung themselves down in speechless ecstasy.

There is _the_ one Holy Coat at Treves, and _the_ one Holy Coat at Moscow; and the priests at either place will tell you that there were never two. The Empress Helena discovered that of Treves, says the legend. A Shah of Persia made a present of the Moscow garment to the Czar. Its genuineness was warranted by a Russian archbishop, who declared that, in a church in Georgia, a golden box placed upon a column had long contained this coat, and that it was doubtless the seamless coat of our Lord. A Muscovite monk standing by clinched the lie, by adding, that when the soldiers cast lots for the possession of the coat, it fell to one who lived in Georgia, and that this was the identical garment. Really, when we think seriously of these things, we must not be too hard upon those who reverenced the coat of the Sybarite.

To return to Alexander: he was the despair of all men who, desirous of following the fashion as he gave it, lacked means to realize the desire. He was to his generals, what very rich Hussar colonels are to the younger and poorer officers; or what Count D’Orsay used to be to the counter-dandies of the Metropolis.

Ephippus lived in the time of Commodus; and in allusion to that Emperor, who used to dress himself as Hercules, and go out daily in his car with the hero’s club, like a gold-headed cane, between his legs, he says:—“Is it extraordinary that in our days Commodus does this, when Alexander, a pupil of Aristotle, did worse in the olden time?”

Certainly, in the article of dress, the son of Philip was as different from the simplicity of his father, as the Prince Regent from George III. Not only did he wear the lion’s skin, and call himself Hercules, but, in private intercourse with his friends, he put on the winged cap and the ankle-pinions of Mercury. If I may say so without profanity, I would remark, that if Prince Albert were to walk through Kensington Gardens attired like David, with a sling and a stone in his hand to fling at the first fat gentleman he might encounter, he would not be committing a more unseemly act than Alexander was doing when he decked himself out to look like Mercury.

But when this wretched madman, the Macedonian I mean, rode out in his chariot, and forgetful of his wry neck—for he _had_ a wry neck, and limped to boot,—and despite his very red nose and his blood-shot eyes, dressed like Diana, the goddess of Chastity, a Persian purple robe about him, and over his naked shoulder a bow and a quiver,—he must have looked as ridiculous in the eyes of the beholders, as if the late Sir William Curtis, who was so solemnly ridiculous in kilts, had exhibited himself daily in front of the Mansion-house in the dress and attitude of the Magdalene of Correggio.

In more modern days, we _have_ had the gods and goddesses assumed by mortal men; but then it has been to amuse, and not to awe the multitude. They were often introduced in the mediæval shows when Burgundy exulted in her Dukes. I may cite, as an instance, the solemnity of the first entry into Lille of Charles the Bold, in his character of Duke of Burgundy. The delicate citizens got up a “mystery” whereby to do honour to the refined prince, which excited great amusement. It was “The Judgement of Paris.” To represent Venus, a tall and enormous woman had been selected, who weighed some twenty stone; Juno was as tall as Venus, but she was withered and lean; Minerva bore a hump both before and behind; while all three goddesses were naked, only wearing rich crowns upon their heads. Charles the Bold must have been as much pleased with pastime like this, as Dr. Pusey would doubtless be were he, in company with Father Newman, to take advantage of an order for two, and go and see Mr. Paul Bedford in the part of Norma.

Mark Antony was, despite his habit of getting drunk by daylight, so careful a dresser that he may be ranked among the _beaux_. Indeed he was specially fantastic in some of his fashions; and, by way of proof that he was the very “first fine gentleman” of his day, it is only necessary to cite what Textor says of him in the preface to the ‘Cornucopia,’ namely, “M. Antonius, Triumvir, corporis excrementa non nisi vasis aureis excipiebat.”

The Scandinavian _beaux_ were as fantastically nice in some of _their_ fashions. Rough as they were, there were many who wasted some amount of thought on the adornment of their persons. Such an individual was the pride of his relatives, and by these he was called, not the flower, but the _leek_ of the family: he generally smelt a good deal stronger. Of such a dandy, his kindred were as proud as the “blood” of Caffarelli was of that smartly-dressed singer. But Caffarelli was a vocal beau who sang to some tune. He lived in a palace of his own building. Over the gate was this inscription:—“Amphion Thebas, ego domum;” and he purchased for his nephew and heir the Dukedom of Sante Dorato. That _was_ a well-dressed uncle, of whom his nephew might well be—what he was not, of course—gratefully proud. Scandinavia reminds me of the great Gustavus Adolphus. He was not indeed himself a _beau_, but he was the first who made modern soldiers such. It was a consequence of his insisting on the necessity of the men being well clothed, and kept clean and warm. Except among Pompey’s cohort, this was not the custom of the ancients, with whom prevailed the maxim, “horridum militem esse decet.” So too thought Tilly, whose doctrine on the matter was comprised in the phrase, “A ragged soldier and a bright musket.” Some of Gustavus’s officers became the tightest-laced “exquisites” of suffering humanity, and reduced their outward surface to such a degree, that, had they lived in remoter times, they might have passed for those unhappy persons who had entered the temple of Jupiter in Arcadia, despite prohibition. The well-known consequence of such an act was, that the offender became for ever shadowless.

There is a race of men, not at all thin, and as rich dressers as Gustavus’s captains; I mean the Cardinals. There is a _reason_ for their wearing red garments. Persons of early Church days used to draw Christian zodiacs and solar systems. In the former, the saints took the place of the old signs. In the latter, the planets were allotted to different religions. The sun belongs to Christianity; _ergo_, _Sunday_ is the sabbath. Rome is the solar, and therefore the holy city; and accordingly the Cardinals wear red, because it is the colour of the sun.

To revert once more to the pupil of Aristotle, there remains but to be said that it was only on state occasions that he appeared in the mantle, sandals, and horns of Ammon. His ordinary dress was a chlamys of purple, a striped tunic (white on a coloured ground), and a wide-flapped hat or cap, with the royal diadem girt around it. He was in fact King of Fashion as well as King of Men; and, like Count D’Orsay, he not only patronized tailors, but, unlike the Count, paid their bills. The two men, in all other respects, were very different; and it cannot be said of them, as of Mr. Hunt’s ‘Light of the World,’ and his fast man in the ‘Awakened Conscience,’ that they are one and the same person in two costumes.

The Greeks generally were remarkable for possessing tailors who worked more according to the locality of their birth than to their merits; thus, Xenophon tells us, in his Life of Socrates, that Demeas, being a Collytensean, supported his household by making cassocks; while Menon, whose birthplace is not given, effected the same object by making cloaks. The custom however is more clearly defined when he adds that the Megarensians supported _their_ families by making short jackets. Aristophanes, in his ‘Acharnians,’ alludes to this fashion when he makes the jovial Dicaopolis say, “Certain rascally fellows, base coin, unfranchised, and counterfeit, and alien citizens, were in the habit of informing against the small cloaks of the Megarians.” Between “cloak” and “jacket,” we may conclude that the article was a vest, or an “almaviva,” or mantle, and that it was no more lawful to wear it in Athens when the state was at war with Megara than it was in accordance with our “customs” a century ago to wear garments embroidered with gold-lace from France. This barbarous habit of denouncing the employment of an article, simply because it is the production of, or named from, an enemy, is still prevalent in the dominions of the Czar. _If_ the thing be used, the name must be changed. Were we to follow the same fashion, no Englishman would condescend to put on a pair of “Russia ducks.”

But I have fallen into modern illustrations of the beau. When that superb animal is being treated of by Dryden, the poet names the various characteristics of divers beaux, from whom Sir Fopling Flutter had derived his own united excellences, which made of him the recognized “Man of Mode.” These are among them:—

“His various modes from various fathers follow:
One taught the toss, and one the new French wallow;
His sword-knot, this; his cravat, this design’d;
And this, the yard-long snake he twirls behind.
From one the sacred periwig he gain’d,
Which wind ne’er blew, nor touch of hat profaned.
Another’s diving bow he did adore,
Which, with a bag, casts all the hair before;—
Till he with full decorum brings it back,
And rises with a water-spaniel shake.”

I have elsewhere noticed that for a “beau” to comb his peruke was a matter of serious business; but it was even more. To do so in presence of a “belle” was to behave to her as became the very pink of politeness. “A wit’s wig,” says Wycherly’s ‘Ranger,’ “has the privilege of being uncombed in the very playhouse, or in the presence⸺” “Ay,” interrupts Dapperwit, “but not in the presence of his mistress; ’tis a greater neglect of her than himself. If she has smugg’d herself up for me, let me plume and flounce my peruke a little for her; there’s ne’er a young fellow in town but will do as much for a mere stranger in the playhouse. Pray lend me your comb.” “Well,” says Ranger, “I would not have men of wit and courage make use of every fop’s mean arts to keep or gain a mistress.” _Dapperwit_. “But don’t you see every day, though a man have ne’er so much wit and courage, his mistress will revolt to those fops who wear and comb perukes well? She comes! she comes! pray, your comb!” and thereupon, snatching Ranger’s comb, he commences drawing it through the wavy honours of his wig, in order to do honour to, and be seen doing it by, his “dear Miss Lucy.” In such wise did Wycherly hold the mirror up to nature, as I find it in his Comedies, published by Richard Bentley, not of New Burlington-street, but by his good ancestor, who, in 1694, tabernacled “at the Post House, in Russell-street, in Covent Garden, near the _Piazza’s_,” as it is written; and who delighted the then novel-reading world with such delectable novels as ‘Zelinda,’ ‘Count Brion,’ ‘The Happy Slave,’ ‘The Disorders of Love,’ ‘The Pilgrim,’ in two parts, and ‘The Princess of Montferrat.’ And I can only express my admiration at the courage of our great-grandmothers, who learned what was unprofitable and not amusing at so vast an outlay of most patient labour.

To one or two modern “beaux” of great celebrity I will now introduce you. Here is a jaunty, impudent, over-dressed gentleman approaching, who will admirably suit our purpose. Pray allow me:—“Gentle Reader, Beau Fielding.” “Beau Fielding, Gentle Reader.”

BEAU FIELDING.

“He pass’d his easy hours, instead of prayer,
In madrigals and Philising the fair.”—GARTH’S _Dispensary_.

Goldsmith once shed tears from his simple, unsophisticated eyes, as he passed through a village at night, and thought that the sleeping inhabitants were unconscious how great a man was journeying that way. I fancy that most people who pass the Reigate station are in a similarly ignorant state of unconsciousness, and are not at all aware that they are close upon the cradle of Orlando the Fair.

I have heard the pleasant author of that pleasant story, ‘Crewe Rise,’ remark that the worthies of Suffolk count in greater numbers than the worthies of any other county. If worthiness be “greatness,” in the sense of Jonathan Wild, Suffolk may envy Surrey such a son as Robert Fielding.

The father of this incomparable youth was a cavalier squire, with something like £500 per annum to nourish his dignity. “Bob” was early entered at the Temple, where he behaved like a Templar; was too idle to study the constitution of England, but very actively worked at the ruin of his own. He thought Fleet-street vulgar, and removed to Scotland-yard, next door to the court, which then rioted at Whitehall.

The “beauty” of his neighbour attracted the notice of that other scamp, Charles II.; and as Fielding was too handsome for anything, the King only made him a Justice of the Peace.

The women however left him none; and their importunities induced him to abandon justice, and devote himself to wine, love-making, and living upon pensions from female purses. In a succeeding reign he gave up the Church, as he had before surrendered justice; and when James II. was King, Fielding assumed Romanism as a good speculation, and was especially zealous not only in protecting Popish chapels from the populace, but in giving asylum to the prettiest devotees of that faith who flew to his bosom for refuge.

He stuck to his profession under William III.; that is, he made none at all; and as he was accounted of no religion, his friends had no difficulty in getting him nominated Major-General. I think this must have been in the Horse Marines. The gallant officer was, at all events, never in fray more serious than with sleepy watchmen and slip-shod waiters, whom he ran through (he was an excellent runner, when peril pursued) with the most astonishing alacrity.

He was the handsomest man and the most extravagantly splendid dresser of his day. When he passed down the Mall at the fashionable hour, there was a universal flutter and sensation. “O’Carroll,” he would then say to his servant, “does my sword touch my right heel? Do the ladies ogle me?”

“It does, Sir. They do, Sir.”

“Then, O’Carroll,” would the beau exclaim aloud, “let them die of love, and be d—d!”

“What a perfect gentleman! what a delicious creature!” chorused the ladies.

“Ay, ay,” said the beau, “look and die! look and die!”

He was not kicked off the public promenade, but he was occasionally so ejected from the public stage. It was the habit or the fashion then for a portion of the audience to stand upon the stage, and the actors played, like mountebanks, in a crowd. It was further the habit of this superlative _beau_ to make remarks aloud upon the ladies in the boxes. The latter,—not the boxes, but the ladies,—were not slow in flinging back retorts; and the players, enraged at being unheeded, would then fairly turn upon Fielding and turn him out, with the ceremony, or want of it, observed in ejecting ill-bred curs.

But the beau was amply compensated for such treatment as this by the favour dealt to him by “officers and gentlemen.” He was once being pursued by bailiffs sent after him by tailors whom he had ruined. As hare and hounds approached St. James’s Palace, the officers on guard turned out, attacked the myrmidons of the law, pinked them all over till they looked like ribbed peppermint, and finally bore Fielding in triumph into the Palace!

The equipage of “Orlando” was not less singular than he was himself. He kept a hired chariot, drawn by his own horses, and attended by two footmen in bright yellow coats and black sarsnet sashes. Maidens sighed as he rode by, and murmured “Adonis!” Admiring widows looked at him and exclaimed, “Handsome as Hercules!” He really did unite the most exquisite beauty both of feature and stature, with the most gigantic strength. Boys followed him in crowds, and hailed him _father_. He showered among them as many curses as blessings. “Did you never see a man before?” he once asked the foremost urchin of a youthful mob. “Never such a one as you, noble general,” answered the lad, an embryo beau from Westminster School. “Sirrah, I believe thee; there is a crown for thy wit.”

Mr. Isaac Bickerstaff states that the beau called himself an antediluvian, in respect of the insects which appeared in the world as men; and the ‘Tatler’ further says, that “he sometimes rode in an open tumbril of less size than ordinary, to show the largeness of his limbs and the grandeur of his personage to the greater advantage. At other seasons all his appointments had a magnificence, as if it were formed by the genius of Trimalchio of old, which showed itself in doing ordinary things with an air of pomp and grandeur. Orlando therefore called for tea by beat of drum; his valet got ready to shave him by a trumpet to horse; and water was brought for his teeth when the sound was changed to boot and saddle.”

Amid all this, the prince of beaux was speculatively looking abroad. At Doctors’ Commons he had seen the will of a Mr. Deleau, who left to his widow a town residence in Copthall-court, a country mansion at Waddon, in Surrey, and sixty thousand pounds, at the lady’s absolute disposal. Fielding resolved to woo, and of course to win her.

His first application was made through an agent, to a Mrs. Villars, who used to act as hair-dresser to the much-sought-after widow. Her services were asked for, under promise of great reward, to bring matters about so that Mrs. Deleau should see Fielding, if it were only, as it were, by accident. The beau thought that if the widow saw, _he_ would conquer. Were a marriage to follow, Fielding promised hundreds out of his wife’s money.

The worthy agents failed to do their hirer’s bidding. He even called at Waddon, under the name of Major-General Villars, and was allowed to see the gardens. He mistook a lady at a window of the house for _the_ lady of whom he was in search, and as she smiled when he put his hand to the left side of his laced waistcoat, and made a bow till his vertebra was horizontal, he concluded that his fortune was made; and the next day he sent letters in his own name, which the servants, knowing the writer, and having their orders, dropped into the fire,—after reading them in the servants’ hall.

The next move was an application to see the grounds at Waddon, professedly from the famous or infamous Duchess of Cleveland, Fielding’s chief patroness,—so low had fallen the mother of dukes and the concubine of a king. Permission was granted, but nothing came of the concession.

In the meantime Mrs. Villars, by no means disposed to lose the promised recompense, persuaded Fielding that the widow had yielded, and would pay him a visit. He was in a state of delight at the intelligence. The lady, however, who was to pass as Mrs. Deleau, was a “Mistress Mary Wadsworth,” who was ready for any joke, and thought the one proposed the best she had ever shared in,—and she had been an actress in many. These two sensitive creatures accordingly repaired to Fielding’s lodgings one soft autumnal eve. The beau was in a flutter of ecstasy, was continually on his knees, and devoted himself to the lowest position in hades if he ever had loved any woman before. The assumed Mrs. Deleau was coy, as became a widow with sixty thousand pounds and no encumbrances. The lover pressed her to be married that night, if she would not have him perish; but she playfully touched his cheek with her fan, and bade him wait and hope,—sad, naughty fellow that he was!

After two more such visits, the soft and tender creature was seduced to sacrifice her scruples, and consented to a private marriage at her lover’s chambers. The party supped joyously together, and then the bridegroom sallied forth in search of a priest. He found one at the Emperor of Germany’s ambassador’s; and his reverence having been introduced to the lady, satisfied her of the reality of his vocation, and in a twinkling buckled beau and belle together in a way, he said, that defied undoing. All the after-ceremonies religiously observed in those refined days ensued; indeed the marriage would not have been half a marriage without them, and so all parties but the dupers were satisfied,—and in fact even _they_ did not complain.

The bride left for home next morning unattended; for family reasons, she averred, it was necessary to keep the union unrevealed, and accordingly she only repaired now and then to see “the Count,” as her husband styled himself, and to eat toasted cheese and drink port and vat-ale with a man who had married her, as he exclaimed at the sacred ceremony, “with all his heart, soul, blood, and everything else!”

There is no comedy of the last century, however absurd the plot, and coarse and ridiculous the incidents, that is more absurd, coarse, and ridiculous than this comedy in which Fielding was the hero and Mistress Wadsworth and the Duchess of Cleveland the heroines. The beau was convinced he had married a widow with a jointure of a golden character. The letters he addressed to the residence of Mrs. Deleau must have caused infinite astonishment to that calm relict of the citizen of Copthall-court; but she held the writer as mad, and thought little more of the matter. In the meantime Fielding, who had patronized half-a-dozen tailors on the strength of his expectations, mysteriously alluded to, acted the strangest of parts. He married her Grace the noble Barbara within three weeks of his union with Mary Wadsworth. He provided himself with two stools for the support of his dignity; and in the very fashion of the proverb, he got very terribly bruised indeed.

The wretched duper turned out to be the dupe. He had expended his cake and wine, his _petit soupers_, wax-lights, and sconces all to no purpose; he had run in debt for a ring with a posy of his own choosing, “_Tibi Soli_;” and he had paid an Italian singer Margaretta to come and sing to his beloved, “Ianthe the lovely,” translated by himself from the Greek. He had looked for threescore thousand pounds, and had been deluded into the idea that he was about to be the sire of a little “Lord Tunbridge,” and at the end of all, the bride proves a common jilt; goes boldly to Fielding’s lodgings in Whitehall, claims him, as he walks into the street, by the title of “lawful wife,” and gets an unsavoury name by way of reply, and a thorough thrashing into the bargain.

The affair soon came into the courts. Fielding, a few weeks after his union with Mistress Mary Wadsworth, had espoused _les beaux restes_ of Barbara Duchess of Cleveland. Till he began to beat the Duchess as well as the Dulcinea, he appears to have transferred his “green nightcap and slippers” by the hands of a servant from the bower of one beauty to the boudoir of another. The Duchess, at length, offered the first wife £200 down and £100 annually for fifteen years, if she succeeded in establishing the first marriage. Accordingly, the Beau was indicted for bigamy at the Old Bailey. He endeavoured to prove that his supposed widow had been married to one Brady, who was living at the time of her marriage with Fielding, and something like a forged certificate in the Fleet Register was produced to support it. But with Montague for opposing counsel (Fielding was his own) and Powell for a judge, the Beau could make nothing of a very bad case; and, being found guilty, he was sentenced to be burnt in the hand,—a sentence which he escaped by producing Queen Anne’s warrant to stay execution. He was accordingly set free; and the Duchess of Cleveland, being now also freed from him and his very heavy hand, the ex-beauty, but now be-rouged old flirt, lived unmolested by anything more unpleasant than a very gentle remorse for her _péchés mignons_.

The Beau soon fell into dire distress; and a sketch of the complexion of this phasis of life will be found in Bulwer’s ‘Devereux.’ He is there described as “terribly fallen, as to fortune, since the day when he drove about in a car like a sea-shell, with a dozen tall fellows in the Austrian livery, black and yellow, running before and behind him. You know he claims relationship to the House of Hapsburg. As for the present, he writes poems, makes love, is still good-natured, humorous, and odd; is rather unhappily addicted to wine and borrowing, and rigidly keeps the oath of the Carthusians, which never suffers them to carry any money about them.”

The Austrian livery however had disappeared after the break with the Duchess. The Beau’s den is probably more correct in its details. “The chamber looked like a place in the other world, set apart for the ghosts of departed furniture. The hangings were wan and colourless; the chairs and sofas were most spiritually unsubstantial; the mirrors reflected all things in a sepulchral sea-green; even a huge picture of Mr. Fielding himself, placed over the chimney-piece, seemed like the apparition of a portrait, so dim, watery, and indistinct had it been rendered by neglect and damp. On a huge, tomb-like table in the middle of the room lay two pencilled profiles of Mr. Fielding, a pair of ruffles, a very little muff, an immense broadsword, a Wycherly comb, a jack-boot, and an old plumed hat; to these were added, a cracked pomatum pot, containing ink, and a scrap of paper, ornamented with sundry paintings of hearts and torches. Upon the ground lay a box of patches, a periwig, and two or three well-thumbed books of songs.” The Beau himself, half bully, half fribble, a poet, a fop, a fighter, a beauty, is described as wearing an old morning dressing-gown of once gorgeous material; a little velvet cap with tarnished gold tassel, military boots, and with a coarse and florid complexion as the remains of a beauty, the expression of which “had settled into a broad, hardy, farcical mixture of effrontery, humour, and conceit.”

But all his effrontery could not keep him afloat, and he finally disappeared altogether from the “world;” and so little was known of his end that men disputed of his burial-place, as of another Atala, and it was quite undetermined whether he died in Hampshire or in Holland. The estimation, however, in which he was held is amply demonstrated in the annexed epitaph by a friend:—

“If Fielding is dead,
And rests under this stone,
Then he is not alive,
You may bet two to one.
But if he’s alive,
And does not lie here,
Let him live till he’s hang’d,
For which no man will care.”

In the 113th number of the ‘Tatler,’ under the motto of “Ecce iterum Crispinus,” the catalogue is given of the effects of a defunct beau: and probably with some allusion to Fielding. Among the articles cited are “A very rich tweezer case, containing twelve instruments for the use of each hour in the day.” To this succeed gilt snuff-boxes, with looking-glasses in the lid, or portraits of equivocal ladies; “a sword with a steel-diamond hilt, never drawn but once at May Fair;” eyebrow brushes, a “pocket perspective,” a dozen pair of red-heeled shoes, three pair of red silk stockings, and an amber-headed cane. The beau’s “strong box” contains “five billets-doux, a Bath shilling, a crooked sixpence, a silk garter, a lock of hair, and three broken fans.” His book-case is instructive: on the upper shelf there are three bottles of diet-drink, two boxes of pills, a syringe, and _other_ mathematical instruments; on the second, there is a miscellaneous collection of lampoons, plays, tailors’ bills, and an almanack for the year 1700; the third shelf holds a bundle of unopened letters, indorsed “from the old gentleman,” with Toland’s ‘Christianity not Mysterious,’ and a paper of “patterns of several fashionable stuffs,”—Toland’s ‘Christianity’ being _stuff_ that was very fashionable at _that_ time. The lowest shelf of all reveals an odd shoe, a pair of snuffers, a French grammar, a mourning hatband, and half a bottle of usquebagh. These “effects” paint the beau of a by-gone time; and Fielding was the grand master of the _petits-maîtres_, who were the proprietors of this very varied property.

There was however as great, as impudent, and as renowned a beau as he. He comes this way in a white hat, and his name is Nash.

BEAU NASH.

“N’achetez pas vos principes chez ce _Gentis homo_, homme de la
nation.”—DE BONALD.

The gaudiest flies spring from the most unsavoury of cradles, and Beau Nash was born in ill-odoured Swansea. He used to say, he “could not help it.” Like Liston, it had been his own intention to be born in Shropshire; but he and the grotesque comedian possessed not the privilege of the embryo saint, whose prayers procured his birth in the locality and at the period which best suited himself. Accordingly, Richard Nash was born at Swansea in the stirring year 1674. His very boyhood was brassy, as befitted so metallic a locality.

In after years, when Nash was at the most brilliant epoch of his butterfly period, and it had for some time been remarked that, much as the Beau talked of other people, he never mentioned his own father, the Duchess of Queensberry, in her Grace’s usual familiar style, asked the meek Richard if he were ashamed of his sire, that he never mentioned him. “Nay, madam,” said Nash, “if I never name him, it is because he has reason to be ashamed of _me_.” It was the only humble speech which Nash ever uttered, and it had truth for its foundation.

The sire of the gay Richard was a quiet individual, a partner in one of the Bristol glass-houses. He had more ambition than wisdom; and he commenced blowing his son into a gentleman by sending him to Jesus College, Oxford, at the age of sixteen. “I hope, Dick,” said the honest man, “you will distinguish yourself before you are a year older.” “Dad,” replied Dick, “I will astonish you _within_ that period.” And he kept his word. Before a year had expired he had taken first-class honours in puppyism, had become the terror or temptation of half the women in Oxford, made an offer of marriage to a young lady as modest as himself; and had got expelled. He _did_ astonish his father!

The good man, on recovering from his surprise, began to perceive that his first attempt at making Dick a gentleman had failed; but he was a determined individual, and had resolved to succeed. Accordingly he bought for young Master Hopeful an ensign’s commission. “Now, Dick,” said he, “the thing is done; you are ‘an officer and a gentleman’ by right of your commission.” Poor old citizen! he might as well have said that the zenith was also the nadir by power of astronomy.

I believe Nash entered the 46th. I am inclined to think so, from the circumstance that he seemed to have lost his memory as soon as he “joined.” He certainly forgot everything but what he had done well not to remember. He forgot to get up to parade; could never remember, when he did rise, the events of the preceding night; even what the chaplain had said to him, over the punch, had gone out of his memory, as it had from that of the reverend gentleman. He was oblivious of every point of duty, never recollected to pay his bills, and was in all things a consummate scamp. The colonel, who might have endured a young fellow who was a more unprincipled scamp than himself, could not tolerate one who was a greater wit. He made the ensign’s life miserable; and as the ensign had determined that his life should not be of that quality, he sold his commission, and, having spent the money, did his father the honour of returning home.

“Go to the devil!” said his sire; and Dick accordingly came up to town, and entered at the Temple. Having done this, he went to the gaming table. It was impossible for son to show more alacrity in setting out on the journey whither his father had sent him.

The ancient gentleman to whom his sire had consigned him must have been proud of his young friend. The latter was at dice one half the night, at balls and assemblies the other half; and he was in bed all day. His gains were devoted not to the comfort of his appetite or the nourishment of his intellect, but almost exclusively to dress. He eclipsed every beau of whatever rank: the women adored, the men hated him, but all acknowledged that a spirited young fellow, who had been expelled college, had found it convenient to withdraw from the army, who was a Templar “for the fun of the thing,” and who was all gold lace and gallantry, was worthy of being the leader of the “_ton_;” and for that matter they were perfectly right.

He was the conductor of the entertainments given by the Middle Temple to William the Third. The Monarch was so pleased with the Master of the Ceremonies that he offered to make him a knight. “That depends,” said the impudent beau, “upon what sort of a chevalier your Majesty would make of me. If it were a ‘poor knight of Windsor,’ I should be rich at once, and well content.” The King shook his head, and Nash lost the honour.

He made up for it by gaining them at whist; and he was so good-tempered a player that even his adversaries bore his triumphs without cursing him—much. The truth is, that he was a terrible rake; but he was not a dishonourable fellow, according to the then existing code of honour. The Templars entrusted him with some portion of their funds. His accounts were once ten pounds short of correctness, and he accounted for its deficit by saying, that he had heard a poor fellow say that ten pounds would make him happy, and he could not resist giving him that sum. The charity was something like that of Mrs. Haller, who gave away her master’s wine to the sick, and got a character for generosity thereby. However, the Templar auditors passed the accounts. The beau’s story was probably true, for he was quick to feel for others, and the readiest man at a lie of his own or any other period.

Nash never frittered away his money in paying his debts. “Doing that vulgar sort of thing,” said he, “never procures you a friend; lending money _does_!” and he was ready to lend to the great when the dice favoured him. The young gentleman’s maxim was quite worthy of one whose “indignant parient” had constituted him a ward of the devil.

His relaxations from town and Temple studies further showed the respect he had for his eminent guardian. During a country excursion he stood in a blanket at the door of York Minster. He professed to be doing penance for his sins, and the clergy cut jokes with him as they passed. He performed this pretty trick for a poor wager of half-a-dozen guineas, and he performed a worse for a bet more trifling; he rode stark-naked through a quiet and astonished village,—an achievement in which he was subsequently imitated by the father of Louis Philippe. But these were little foibles the most readily forgiven by the ladies: how could they be angry with a fine gentleman, whose gallantry was so great that when he sat next one at table he made love to her then and there, and swore with the most liberal parade of oaths that he never drank any wine but such as had been “first strained through his mistress’s smock!”

And then the pretty process was gone through, amid a world of wild talk that would nowadays somewhat ruffle even the Vestas of Cremorne; but the fair creatures of William’s age declared him to be “a dear, delicate,” and some Lady Bettys added, in their grapy enthusiasm, “a d—d gallant fellow.” His friend Satan must have chuckled at the word.

It is quite possible that after some one of these orgies, he was, by way of a good practical joke, carried off, by a captain as drunk as himself, on board a ship to the Mediterranean. It is quite certain that he disappeared for a considerable period; and when he turned up again, he not only told the tale of his abduction, but averred that he had been in a naval battle, and had received a ball in the leg. He was one night repeating the oft-told tale in the Bath rooms, when a countess boldly expressed her disbelief of the alleged fact. Nash imprecated upon her the disease which very fine people who quarrelled used to fling at one another, and then said, as he put up his leg on her lap, “The ball is there, Madam; and if you will, you may feel it!”