Club Life of London Volume I Part 20

Another critic remarks: "The Travellers' fairly makes an epoch in the architectural history of Club-houses, as being almost the first, if not the very first, attempt, to introduce into this country that species of rich _astylar_ composition which has obtained the name of the Italian palazzo mode, by way of contradistinction from Palladianism and its orders. This production of Barry's has given a fresh impulse to architectural design, and one in a more artistic direction; and the style adopted by the architect has been applied to various other buildings in the provinces as well as in the metropolis; and its influence has manifested itself in the taste of our recent street architecture."

The Travellers' narrowly escaped destruction on October 24, 1850, when a fire did great damage to the billiard-rooms, which were, by the way, an afterthought, and addition to the original building, but by no means an improvement upon the first design, for they greatly impaired the beauty of the garden-front.

THE UNITED SERVICE CLUB.

One of the oldest of the modern Clubs, was inst.i.tuted the year after the Peace of 1815, when a few officers of influence in both branches of the Service had built for them, by Sir R. Smirke, a Club-house at the corner of Charles-street and Regent-street,--a frigid design, somewhat relieved by sculpture on the entrance-front, of Britannia distributing laurels to her brave sons by land and sea. Thence the Club removed to a more s.p.a.cious house, in Waterloo-place, facing the Athenaeum; the Club-house in Charles-street being entered on by the Junior United Service Club; but Smirke's cold design has been displaced by an edifice of much more ornate exterior and luxurious internal appliances.

The United Service Club (Senior) was designed by Nash, and has a well-planned interior, exhibiting the architect's well-known excellence in this branch of his profession. The princ.i.p.al front facing Pall Mall has a Roman-Doric portico; and above it a Corinthian portico, with pediment. One of the patriarchal members of the Club was Lord Lynedoch, the hero of the Peninsular War, who lived under five sovereigns: he died in his 93rd year, leaving behind him a name to be held in honoured remembrance, while loyalty is considered to be a real virtue, or military renown a pa.s.sport to fame. It is a curious fact that the Duke of Wellington fought his last battle at an earlier period of life than that in which Lord Lynedoch "fleshed his maiden sword;" and though we were accustomed to regard the Duke himself as preserving his vigour to a surprisingly advanced age, Lord Lynedoch was at his death old enough to have been the father of his Grace. The United Service was the favourite Club of the Duke, who might often be seen dining here on a joint; and on one occasion, when he was charged 1_s._ 3_d._ instead of 1_s._ for it, he bestirred himself till the threepence was struck off. The motive was obvious: he took the trouble of objecting, so that he might sanction the principle.

Among the Club pictures is Jones's large painting of the Battle of Waterloo; and the portrait of the Duke of Wellington, painted for the Club by W. Robinson. Here also are Stanfield's fine picture of the Battle of Trafalgar; and a copy, by Lane, painted in 1851, of a contemporary portrait of Sir Francis Drake, our "Elizabethan Sea-King." The Club-house has of late years been considerably enlarged.

THE ALFRED CLUB.

In the comparatively quiet Albemarle-street was inst.i.tuted, in 1808, the Alfred Club, which has, _ab initio_, been remarkable for the number of travellers and men of letters, who form a considerable proportion of its members. Science is handsomely housed at the Royal Inst.i.tution, on the east side of the street; and literature n.o.bly represented by the large publis.h.i.+ng-house of Mr. Murray, on the west; both circ.u.mstances tributary to the _otium_ enjoyed in a Club. Yet, strangely enough, its position has been a frequent source of banter to the Alfred. First it was known by its c.o.c.kney appellation of _Half-read_. Lord Byron was a member, and he tells us that "it was pleasant, a little too sober and literary, and bored with Sotheby and Francis D'Ivernois; but one met Rich, and Ward, and Valentia, and many other pleasant or known people; and it was, in the whole, a decent resource in a rainy day, in a dearth of parties, or Parliament, or in an empty season."

Lord Dudley, writing to the Bishop of Llandaff, says: "I am glad you mean to come into the Alfred this time. We are the most abused, and most envied, and most canva.s.sed, Society that I know of, and we deserve neither the one nor the other distinction. The Club is not so good a resource as many respectable persons would believe, nor are we by any means such quizzes or such bores as the wags pretend. A duller place than the Alfred there does not exist. I should not choose to be quoted for saying so, but the bores prevail there to the exclusion of every other interest. You hear nothing but idle reports and twaddling opinions. They read the _Morning Post_ and the _British Critic_. It is the asylum of doting Tories and drivelling quidnuncs. But they are civil and quiet. You belong to a much better Club already. The eagerness to get into it is prodigious."

Then, we have the _Quarterly Review_, with confirmation strong of the two Lords:--"The Alfred received its _coup-de-grace_ from a well-known story, (rather an indication than a cause of its decline,) to the effect that Mr. Canning, whilst in the zenith of his fame, dropped in accidentally at a house dinner of twelve or fourteen, stayed out the evening, and made himself remarkably agreeable, without any one of the party suspecting who he was."

The dignified clergy, who, with the higher cla.s.s of lawyers, have long ago emigrated to the Athenaeum and University Clubs, formerly mustered in such great force at the Alfred, that Lord Alvanley, on being asked in the bow-window at White's, whether he was still a member, somewhat irreverently replied: "Not exactly: I stood it as long as I could, but when the seventeenth bishop was proposed I gave in. I really could not enter the place without being put in mind of my catechism."

"Sober-minded people," says the _Quarterly Review_, "may be apt to think this formed the best possible reason for his lords.h.i.+p's remaining where he was. It is hardly necessary to say that the presence of the bishops and judges is universally regarded as an unerring test of the high character of a Club."

THE ORIENTAL CLUB.

Several years ago, the high dignitaries of the Church and Law kept the Alfred to themselves; but this would not do: then they admitted a large number of very respectable good young men, who were unexceptionable, but not very amusing. This, again, would not do. So, now the Alfred joined, 1855, the Oriental, in Hanover-square. And curiously enough, the latter Club has been quizzed equally with the Alfred. In the merry days of the _New Monthly Magazine_ of some thirty years since, we read:--"The Oriental--or, as the hackney-coachmen call it, the Horizontal Club--in Hanover-square, outdoes even Arthur's for quietude. Placed at the corner of a _cul-de-sac_--at least as far as carriages are concerned, and in a part of the Square to which n.o.body not proceeding to one of four houses which occupy that particular side ever thinks of going, its little windows, looking upon nothing, give the idea of mingled dulness and inconvenience. From the outside it looks like a prison;--enter it, it looks like an hospital, in which a smell of curry-powder pervades the 'wards,'--wards filled with venerable patients, dressed in nankeen shorts, yellow stockings, and gaiters, and faces to match. _There_ may still be seen pigtails in all their pristine perfection. It is the region of calico s.h.i.+rts, returned writers, and guinea-pigs grown into bores. Such is the _nabobery_, into which Harley-street, Wimpole-street, and Glocester-place, daily empty their precious stores of bilious humanity." Time has blunted the point of this satiric picture, the individualities of which had pa.s.sed away, even before the amalgamation of the Oriental with the Alfred.

The Oriental Club was established in 1824, by Sir John Malcolm, the traveller and brave soldier. The members were n.o.blemen and gentlemen a.s.sociated with the administration of our Eastern empire, or who have travelled or resided in Asia, at St. Helena, in Egypt, at the Cape of Good Hope, the Mauritius, or at Constantinople.

The Oriental was erected in 1827-8, by B. and P. Wyatt, and has the usual Club characteristic of only one tier of windows above the ground-floor; the interior has since been redecorated and embellished by Collman.

THE ATHENaeUM CLUB.

The Athenaeum presents a good ill.u.s.tration of the present Club system, of which it was one of the earliest instances. By reference to the accounts of the Clubs existing about the commencement of the present century, it will be seen how greatly they differed, both in const.i.tution and purpose, from the modern large subscription-houses, called Clubs; and which are to be compared with their predecessors only in so far as every member must be balloted for, or be chosen by the consent of the rest. Prior to 1824, there was only one inst.i.tution in the metropolis particularly devoted to the a.s.sociation of Authors, Literary Men, Members of Parliament, and promoters generally of the Fine Arts. All other establishments were more or less exclusive, comprising gentlemen who screened themselves in the windows of White's, or Members for Counties who darkened the doors of Brookes's; or they were dedicated to the Guards, or "men of wit and pleasure about town." It is true that the Royal Society had its convivial meetings, as we have already narrated; and small Clubs of members of other learned Societies, were held; but with these exceptions, there were no Clubs where individuals known for their scientific or literary attainments, artists of eminence in any cla.s.s of the Fine Arts, and n.o.blemen and gentlemen distinguished as patrons of science, literature, and the arts, could unite in friendly and encouraging intercourse; and professional men were compelled either to meet at taverns, or to be confined exclusively to the Society of their particular professions.

To remedy this, on the 17th of February, 1824, a preliminary meeting,--comprising Sir Humphry Davy, the Right Hon. John Wilson Croker, Sir Francis Chantrey, Richard Heber, Sir Thomas Lawrence, Dr.

Thomas Young, Lord Dover, Davie Gilbert, the Earl of Aberdeen, Sir Henry Halford, Sir Walter Scott, Joseph Jekyll, Thomas Moore, and Charles Hatchett,--was held in the apartments of the Royal Society, at Somerset House; at this meeting Professor Faraday a.s.sisted as secretary, and it was agreed to inst.i.tute a Club to be called "The Society," subsequently altered to "The Athenaeum." "The Society" first met in the Clarence Club-house; but, in 1830, the present mansion, designed by Decimus Burton, was opened to the members.

The Athenaeum Club-house is built upon a portion of the court-yard of Carlton House. The architecture is Grecian, with a frieze exactly copied from the Panathenaic procession in the frieze of the Parthenon,--the flower and beauty of Athenian youth, gracefully seated on the most exquisitely sculptured horses, which Flaxman regarded as the most precious example of Grecian power in the sculpture of animals. Over the Roman Doric entrance-portico is a colossal figure of Minerva, by Baily, R.A.; and the interior has some fine casts of _chefs-d'oeuvre_ of sculpture. Here the architecture is grand, ma.s.sive, and severe. The n.o.ble Hall, 35 feet broad by 57 feet long, is divided by scagliola columns and pilasters, the capitals copied from the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates. This is the Exchange, or Lounge, where the members meet. The floor is the Marmorato Veneziano mosaic.

Over each of the two fire-places, in a niche, is a statue--the Diana Robing and the Venus Victrix, selected by Sir Thomas Lawrence--a very fine contrivance for sculptural display. The Library is the best Club Library in London: it comprises the most rare and valuable works, and a very considerable sum is annually expended upon the collection, under the guidance of members most eminent in literature and science.

Above the mantelpiece is a portrait of George IV., painted by Lawrence, upon which he was engaged but a few hours previous to his decease; the last bit of colour this celebrated artist ever put upon canvas being that of the hilt and sword-knot of the girdle; thus it remains unfinished. The bookcases of the drawing-rooms are crowned with busts of British worthies. Among the Club gossip it is told that a member who held the Library faith of the promise of the Fathers, and was anxious to consult their good works, one day asked, in a somewhat familiar tone of acquaintance with these respectable theologians, "Is Justin Martyr here?"--"I do not know," was the reply; "I will refer to the list, but I do not think that gentleman is one of our members."

Mr. Walker, in his very pleasant work, _The Original_, was one of the first to show how by the then new system of Clubs the facilities of living were wonderfully increased, whilst the expense was greatly diminished. For a few pounds a year, advantages are to be enjoyed which no fortunes, except the most ample, can procure. The only Club (he continues) I belong to is the Athenaeum, which consists of twelve hundred members, amongst whom are to be reckoned a large proportion of the most eminent persons in the land, in every line,--civil, military, and ecclesiastical,--peers spiritual and temporal (ninety-five n.o.blemen and twelve bishops), commoners, men of the learned professions, those connected with science, the arts, and commerce, in all its princ.i.p.al branches, as well as the distinguished who do not belong to any particular cla.s.s. Many of these are to be met with every day, living with the same freedom as in their own houses, for 25 guineas entrance, and 6 guineas a year. Every member has the command of an excellent library, with maps; of newspapers, English and foreign; the princ.i.p.al periodicals; writing materials, and attendance.

The building is a sort of palace, and is kept with the same exactness and comfort as a private dwelling. Every member is master, without any of the trouble of a master: he can come when he pleases, and stay away when he pleases, without anything going wrong; he has the command of regular servants, without having to pay or manage them; he can have whatever meal or refreshment he wants, at all hours, and served up as in his own house. He orders just what he pleases, having no interest to think of but his own. In short, it is impossible to suppose a greater degree of liberty in living.

"Clubs, as far as my observation goes, are favourable to economy of time. There is a fixed place to go to, everything is served with comparative expedition, and it is not customary in general to remain long at table. They are favourable to temperance. It seems that when people can freely please themselves, and when they have an opportunity of living simply, excess is seldom committed. From an account I have of the expenses at the Athenaeum in the year 1832, it appears that 17,323 dinners cost, on an average, 2_s._ 9_d._ each, and that the average quant.i.ty of wine for each person was a small fraction more than half-a-pint.

"The expense of building the Club-house was 35,000_l._, and 5,000_l._ for furnis.h.i.+ng; the plate, linen, and gla.s.s cost 2,500_l._; library, 4,000_l._, and the stock of wine in cellar is usually worth about 4000_l._: yearly revenue about 9000_l._"

The economical management of the Club has not, however, been effected without a few sallies of humour. In 1834, we read: "The mixture of Whigs, Radicals, _savants_, foreigners, dandies, authors, soldiers, sailors, lawyers, artists, doctors, and Members of both Houses of Parliament, together with an exceedingly good average supply of bishops, render the _melange_ very agreeable, despite of some two or three bores, who 'continually do dine;' and who, not satisfied with getting a 6_s._ dinner for 3_s._ 6_d._, 'continually do complain.'"

Mr. Rogers, the poet, was one of the earliest members of the Athenaeum, and innumerable are the good things, though often barbed with bitterness, which are recorded of him.

Some years ago, judges, bishops, and peers used to congregate at the Athenaeum; but a club of twelve hundred members cannot be select.

"Warned by the necessity of keeping up their number and their funds, they foolishly set abroad a report that the finest thing in the world was to belong to the Athenaeum; and that an opportunity offered for hobn.o.bbing with archbishops, and hearing Theodore Hook's jokes.

Consequently all the little crawlers and parasites, and gentility-hunters, from all corners of London, set out upon the creep; and they crept in at the windows and they crept down the area steps, and they crept in unseen at the doors, and they crept in under bishops' sleeves, and they crept in in peers' pockets, and they were blown in by the winds of chance. The consequence has been, that ninety-nine hundredths of this Club are people who rather seek to obtain a sort of standing by belonging to the Athenaeum, than to give it l.u.s.tre by the talent of its members. Nine-tenths of the intellectual writers of the age would be certainly black-balled by the dunces. Notwithstanding all this, and partly on account of this, the Athenaeum is a capital Club: the library is certainly the best Club library in London, and is a great advantage to a man who writes."[22]

Theodore Hook was one of the most clubbable men of his time. After a late breakfast, he would force and strain himself at large arrears of literary toil, and then drive rapidly from Fulham to town, and pay a visit "first to one Club, where, the centre of an admiring circle, his intellectual faculties were again upon the stretch, and again aroused and sustained by artificial means: the same thing repeated at a second--the same drain and the same supply--ballot or general meeting at a third, the chair taken by Mr. Hook, who addresses the members, produces the accounts, audits and pa.s.ses them--gives a succinct statement of the prospects and finances of the Society--parries an awkward question--extinguishes a grumbler--confounds an opponent--proposes a vote of thanks to himself, seconds, carries it,--and returns thanks, with a vivacious rapidity that entirely confounds the unorganized schemes of the minority--then a chop in the committee-room, and just one tumbler of brandy-and-water, or _two_, and we fear the catalogue would not always close there."

At the Athenaeum, Hook was a great card; and in a note to the sketch of him in the _Quarterly Review_, it is stated that the number of dinners at this Club fell off by upwards of three hundred per annum after Hook disappeared from his favourite corner, near the door of the coffee-room. That is to say, there must have been some dozens of gentlemen who chose to dine there once or twice every week of the season, merely for the chance of Hook's being there, and permitting them to draw their chairs to his little table in the course of the evening. Of the extent to which he suffered from this sort of invasion, there are several bitter oblique complaints in his novels.

The _corner_ alluded to will, we suppose, long retain the name which it derived from him--_Temperance Corner_. Many grave and dignified personages being frequent guests, it would hardly have been seemly to be calling for repeated supplies of a certain description; but the waiters well understood what the oracle of the corner meant by "Another gla.s.s of toast and water," or, "A little more lemonade."

FOOTNOTES:

[22] New Quarterly Review.

THE UNIVERSITY CLUB.

In Suffolk-street, Pall Mall East, was inst.i.tuted in 1824, and the Club-house, designed by Deering and Wilkins, architects, was opened in 1826. It is of the Grecian Doric and Ionic orders; and the staircase walls have casts from the Parthenon frieze. The Club consists chiefly of Members of Parliament who have received University education; several of the judges, and a large number of beneficed clergymen. This Club has the reputation of possessing the best stocked wine-cellar in London, which is of no small importance to Members, clerical or lay.

ECONOMY OF CLUBS.

Thirty years ago, Mr. Walker took some pains to disabuse the public mind of a false notion that female society was much affected by the multiplication of Clubs. He remarks that in those hours of the evening, which are peculiarly dedicated to society, he could scarcely count twenty members in the suite of rooms upstairs at the Athenaeum Club. If female society be neglected, he contended that it was not owing to the inst.i.tution of Clubs, but more probably to the long sittings of the House of Commons, and to the want of easy access to family circles. At the Athenaeum he never heard it even hinted, that married men frequented it to the prejudice of their domestic habits, or that bachelors were kept from general society. Indeed, Mr. Walker maintains, that Clubs are a preparation and not a subst.i.tute for domestic life. Compared with the previous system of living, they induce habits of economy, temperance, refinement, regularity, and good order. Still, a Club only offers an imitation of the comforts of home, but only an imitation, and one which will never supersede the reality.

However, the question became a subject for pleasant satire. Mrs. Gore, in one of her clever novels, has these shrewd remarks:--"London Clubs, after all, are not bad things for family men. They act as conductors to the storms usually hovering in the air. The man forced to remain at home and vent his crossness on his wife and children, is a much worse animal to bear with, than the man who grumbles his way to Pall Mall, and not daring to swear at the Club-servants, or knock about the club-furniture, becomes socialized into decency. Nothing like the subordination exercised in a community of equals for reducing a fiery temper."