But the Doctor's meaning and also the real fact was, that he resided at Rochester only during the week of the Audit!* 66 66 Among the laity, as might have been expected, a corresponding neglect of Church ordinances was too often found. Bishop Newton cites it as a most signal and unusual instance of religious duty, that Mr. George Grenville "regularly attended the service of the Church every Sunday morning, even while he was in the highest offices." Not only was Sunday the common day for Cabinet Councils and Cabinet dinners, but the very hours of its morning service were frequently appointed for political interviews and conferences. † It is gratifying to reflect, how clear and constant since that time has been the improvement on such points. The Lord Lieutenant, and for very many former years the representative, of one of the Midland shires, has told me that when he came of age there were only two landed gentlemen in his county who had family prayers, whilst at present, as he believes, there are scarcely two that have not. We may also observe with pleasure, that many as were the neglects and shortcomings of the Clergy in that age, their lives, at least, were pure. No charge of immorality can, with justice, be brought against them, unless in such few and rare cases as in any very numerous body must, of course, in time arise. The Dissenters of that age, or some of them, might have more zeal, but had even less of learning. In some cases we find their deficiencies acknowledged by themselves. Here is one entry from the Minutes of the Methodist Conference, in May, 1765. "Do not our "people in general talk too much, and read too little? They do." 66 To the neglect of education in that age we may also in part ascribe the prevalence of drinking and gaming. It is remarkable how widely the former extended, notwithstanding the high prices of wine. Swift notes in his account-book, that going with a friend to a London * Account of his own Life, by Bishop Newton; Works, vol. i. p. 126. ed. 1787. See for example the Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 337. ; and Franklin's Works, vol. v. p. 48. LIFE AND MANNERS.] HARD-DRINKING. 321 tavern, they paid sixteen shillings for two bottles of "Portugal and Florence." Instances of gross intemperance were certainly in that age not rare. Lord Eldon assured me, that he had seen at Oxford a Doctor of Divinity whom he knew, so far the worse for a convivial entertainment, that he was unable to walk home without leaning for support with his hand upon the walls; but having, by some accident, staggered to the rotunda of the Radcliffe Library, which was not as yet protected by a railing, he continued to go round and round, wondering at the unwonted length of the street, but still revolving, and supposing he went straight, until some friend. perhaps the future Chancellor himself-relieved him from his embarrassment, and set him on his way. Even where there might be no positive excess, the best company of that day would devote a long time to the circulation of the bottle. In Scotland, where habits of hard-drinking were still far more rife than in England, the principal landed gentlemen, some eighty years ago, dined for the most part at four o'clock, and did not quit the dining-room nor rejoin the ladies till ten or eleven. Sometimes, as among the Edinburgh magnates, there might be a flow of bright conviviality and wit, but in most cases nothing could well be duller than these topers. There is named a Lowland gentleman of large estate, and well remembered in Whig circles, who used to say that, as he thought, "the great bane of all society is conversa"tion!" The same hard-drinking tendency in Scotland may be traced in another fact, that while any young man of gentle blood was deemed to lose caste if he engaged in trade, an exception by common consent was made for the congenial business of a wine merchant. Gaming was abhorred by George the Second no less than by George the Third. † But, in spite of the Royal discountenance, it flourished through the whole period comprised in the present History. There is one case recorded of a lady who lost three thousand guineas at one sitting at Loo. Among the men, Brookes' Club, * Journal to Stella, October 8. 1710. Letter of Lord Chesterfield to his Son, June 26. 1752, ad finem. Ann. Register, 1766, p. 61. 66 and White's are mentioned, as more especially the seats of high play. Mr. Wilberforce, coming up to London as a young man of fortune, has related the endeavours that were used to engage him at a Faro-table in the former, where George Selwyn kept bank. And, he adds, “The very first time I went to Boodle's I won twenty-five "guineas of the Duke of Norfolk."* Many in that age were the ancestral forests felled, and the goodly lands disposed of to gratify this passion-scarcely less than in the days of Charles the Second, when the King himself would hold the dice-box, and when Lord Carnarvon used to say that wood was an excrescence of the earth provided by Nature for the payment of debts!† But, although the high play continued, the games were wholly changed. Thus, the terms in Ombre and Bassette, which Pope in his "Rape of the Lock," and Lady Mary Wortley in her "Town Eclogues," assume as quite familiar, became by degrees almost unintelligible. The discovery of a new game in the last years of the American War tended greatly to diffuse the spirit of gaming from the higher to the lower classes. This was the E. O. table, which was thought to be beyond the reach of law, because not distinctly specified in any Statute In 1782 a Bill was brought in, providing severe penalties against this or any other new games of chance; and the Bill, after some debate, passed the Commons, but in the Lords was lost, owing to the lateness of the Session and the pressure of business at Lord Rockingham's death. In the debates upon this subject, Mr. Byng, as Member for Middlesex, stated, that in two parishes only of Westminster there were 296 E. O. tables, and that he knew of instances where bankrupts had gained 20,000l. by E. O. Another Member added, that at least 500 other tables were upon the stocks, and that E. O. tables might now be found at almost every country town. Servants and apprentices, it seems, were drawn in to take part in these games, cards of direction to them being often thrown * Life of Wilberforce, by his Sons, vol. i. p. 16. † See Pepys's Diary, May 5. 1667. Lords' Journals, July, 1782. The Bill with the Lords was three times in Committee, on July 6. 8. and 9., and several amendments had been made, but the Session was closed on the 11th. LIFE AND MANNERS.] E. O. TABLES. 323 down the areas of the houses; and the comers in were allowed to play on Sundays as freely as on other days. * Sheridan, who, from his own private life, could not be expected to view the new Bill with any great favour, said against it, with some truth, that "it would be in vain "to prohibit E. O. tables while a more pernicious mode "of gaming was countenanced by law. he meant the 66 gaming in the lottery." Private lotteries were indeed prohibited, but State lotteries had long been ranked among our sources of revenue. In 1763, two lotteries were for the first time established in one year. In 1788 Mr. Pitt estimated the clear annual gains which they brought to Government at no less than 260,000l.; such, he said, was the rage and madness for this species of gambling, and such the bargain which, on competition among several bidders, he had made. This "lottery madness," as it has been truly termed, was it seems indulged in by night as well as by day. A traveller to London in 1775 observes that he could not help looking with displeasure at the number of paper lanthorns that dangled before the doors of lottery offices, considering them as so many false lights hung out to draw fools to their destruction. † Moreover, the mode of deciding the lottery prizes in that age seemed as though expressly designed to favour gambling speculation, and came to be prohibited long before the lotteries themselves had ceased. A certain number of tickets was drawn and declared each day, so that, according to the proportion drawn and to the prizes left behind, the price of the remaining tickets was enhanced. So common and well-known was this practice that it might afford an illustration to the moralist and preacher. "At the close of the lottery of life" — thus to Pope writes Bishop Atterbury "our last minutes, "like tickets left in the wheel, rise in their valuation." + Besides such ill practices as drinking and gaming, we * See the Parl. Hist. vol. xxiii. p. 110-113.; and Miss Edgeworth's Belinda, ch. xxviii. † Ann. Regist. 1775, part. ii. p. 189. Letter dated November 23. 1731. This passage may be compared with the beautiful moral illustration drawn by Addison from an abstruse point in mathematics - the Asymptotes. (See the Spectator, No. cxi.) may further ascribe to that age not merely a more frequent breach of moral obligations, but also, even where no fault of conduct is imputed, a want of moral refinement. We may guess the customary nature of the talk or the songs after dinner, when we find that in great houses the chaplain was expected to retire with the ladies. But in many cases we find this want of moral refinement extend even to the other sex. Of this a strong instance is afforded in a letter, hitherto unpublished, from a great politician and party-leader, William Pulteney, at that time Earl of Bath. Writing to his relative Colman, who had begun to practise as a Barrister, Lord Bath, whether in jest or earnest, alludes as follows to his own family circle:-"This letter I direct to you at Shrewsbury (on Circuit), which is the nearest place to find you in. If you are concerned in the trial of any rape, the ladies "desire you would send a minute particular account of all "that passed in it.”* Another strong proof of the same conclusion may be gathered from the correspondence of Sir Walter Scott. His grand-aunt, Mrs. Keith of Ravelstone, a lady then far advanced in life, applied to him in his younger years, to obtain for her perusal the novels of Mrs. Afra Behn- some of the most licentious in the language. Scott, though not without some qualms, complied with the request. The peccant volumes were, however, most speedily returned. "Take back your bonny Mrs. Behn," said Mrs. Keith, "and if you will follow my advice, put "her in the fire. But is it not a strange thing," she added, "that I, a woman of eighty, sitting alone, feel "myself ashamed to look through a book which, sixty years ago, I have heard read aloud for the amusement "of large circles of the best company in London ? "† By the course of novels and romances we may indeed measure, in some degree, the advance of moral refinement in our countrywomen. Fielding, whose masterpiece, Tom Jones, appeared in 1749, though far less licentious than Mrs. Behn, is far more so than the present taste approves. The same remark applies both to Smollett and to * MS. letter March 23. 1759. Original in Brit. Mus. purchased 1852. † Letter from Sir Walter Scott to Lady Louisa Stuart, 1821. Life by Lockhart, vol. v. p. 136. first ed. |