The Wits and Beaux of Society Part 12

Perhaps the King of Bath would not have tolerated in any one else the juvenile frolics he delighted in after-years to relate of his own early days. When at a loss for cash, he would do anything, but work, for a fifty pound note, and having, in one of his trips, lost all his money at York, the Beau undertook to 'do penance' at the minster door for that sum. He accordingly arrayed himself--not in sackcloth and ashes--but in an able-bodied blanket, and nothing else, and took his stand at the porch, just at the hour when the dean would be going in to read service.

'He, ho,' cried that dignitary, who knew him, 'Mr. Nash in masquerade?'--'Only a Yorks.h.i.+re penance, Mr. Dean,' quoth the reprobate; 'for keeping bad company, too,' pointing therewith to the friends who had come to see the sport.

This might be tolerated, but when in the eighteenth century a young man emulates the hardiness of G.o.diva, without her merciful heart, we may not think quite so well of him. Mr. Richard Nash, Beau Extraordinary to the Kingdom of Bath, once rode through a village in that costume of which even our first parent was rather ashamed, and that, too, on the back of a cow! The wager was, I believe, considerable. A young Englishman did something more respectable, yet quite as extraordinary, at Paris, not a hundred years ago, for a small bet. He was one of the stoutest, thickest-built men possible, yet being but eighteen, had neither whisker nor moustache to masculate his clear English complexion. At the Maison Doree one night he offered to ride in the Champs Elysees in a lady's habit, and not be mistaken for a man. A friend undertook to dress him, and went all over Paris to hire a habit that would fit his round figure.

It was hopeless for a time, but at last a good-sized body was found, and added thereto, an ample skirt. Felix dressed his hair with _mainte_ plats and a _net_. He looked perfect, but in coming out of the hairdresser's to get into his fly, unconsciously pulled up his skirt and displayed a st.u.r.dy pair of well-trousered legs. A crowd--there is always a ready crowd in Paris--was waiting, and the laugh was general. This hero reached the horse-dealer's--'mounted,' and rode down the Champs. 'A very fine woman that,' said a Frenchman in the promenade, 'but what a back she has!' It was in the return bet to this that a now well-known diplomat drove a goat-chaise and six down the same fas.h.i.+onable resort, with a monkey, dressed as a footman, in the back seat. The days of folly did not, apparently end with Beau Nash.

There is a long lacuna in the history of this worthy's life, which may have been filled up by a residence in a spunging-house, or by a temporary appointment as billiard-marker; but the heroic Beau accounted for his disappearance at this time in a much more romantic manner. He used to relate that he was once asked to dinner on board of a man-of-war under orders for the Mediterranean, and that such was the affection the officers entertained for him, that, having made him drunk--no difficult matter--they weighed anchor, set sail, and carried the successor of King Bladud away to the wars. Having gone so far, Nash was not the man to neglect an opportunity for imaginary valour. He therefore continued to relate, that, in the apocryphal vessel, he was once engaged in a yet more apocryphal encounter, and wounded in the leg. This was a little too much for the good Bathonians to believe, but Nash silenced their doubts.

On one occasion, a lady who was present when he was telling this story, expressed her incredulity.

'I protest, madam,' cried the Beau, lifting his leg up, 'it is true, and if I cannot be believed, your ladys.h.i.+p may, if you please, receive further information and feel the ball in my leg.'

Wherever Nash may have pa.s.sed the intervening years, may be an interesting speculation for a German professor, but is of little moment to us. We find him again, at the age of thirty, taking first steps towards the complete subjugation of the kingdom he afterwards ruled.

There is, among the hills of Somersets.h.i.+re, a huge basin formed by the river Avon, and conveniently supplied with a natural gush of hot water, which can be turned on at any time for the cleansing of diseased bodies.

This hollow presents many curious anomalies; though sought for centuries for the sake of health, it is one of the most unhealthily-situated places in the kingdom; here the body and the pocket are alike cleaned out, but the spot itself has been noted for its dirtiness since the days of King Bladud's wise pigs; here, again, the diseased flesh used to be healed, but the healthy soul within it speedily besickened: you came to cure gout and rheumatism, and caught in exchange dice-fever.

The mention of those pigs reminds me that it would be a shameful omission to speak of this city without giving the story of that apocryphal British monarch, King Bladud. But let me be the one exception; let me respect the good sense of the reader, and not insult him by supposing him capable of believing a mythic jumble of kings and pigs and dirty marshes, which he will, if he cares to, find at full length in any 'Bath Guide'--price sixpence.

But whatever be the case with respect to the Celtic sovereign, there is, I presume, no doubt, that the Romans were here, and probably the centurians and tribunes cast the _alea_ in some pristine a.s.sembly-room, or wagged their plumes in some well-built Pump-room, with as much spirit of fas.h.i.+on as the full-bottomed-wig exquisites in the reign of King Nash. At any rate Bath has been in almost every age a common centre for health-seekers and gamesters--two antipodal races who always flock together--and if it has from time to time declined, it has only been for a period. Saxon churls and Norman lords were too st.u.r.dy to catch much rheumatic gout; crusaders had better things to think of than their imaginary ailments; good-health was in fas.h.i.+on under Plantagenets and Tudors; doctors were not believed in; even empirics had to praise their wares with much wit, and Morrison himself must have mounted a bank and dressed in Astleyian costume in order to find a customer; sack and small-beer were harmless, when homes were not comfortable enough to keep earl or churl by the fireside, and 'out-of-doors' was the proper drawing-room for a man: in short, sickness came in with civilization, indisposition with immoral habits, fevers with fine gentlemanliness, gout with greediness, and valetudinarianism--there _is_ no Anglo-Saxon word for that--with what we falsely call refinement. So, whatever Bath may have been to pampered Romans, who over-ate themselves, it had little importance to the stout, healthy middle ages, and it was not till the reign of Charles II. that it began to look up. Doctors and touters--the two were often one in those days--thronged there, and fools were found in plenty to follow them. At last the blessed countenance of portly Anne smiled on the pig styes of King Bladud. In 1703 she went to Bath, and from that time 'people of distinction' flocked there. The a.s.semblage was not perhaps very brilliant or very refined. The visitors danced on the green, and played privately at hazard. A few sharpers found their way down from London; and at last the Duke of Beaufort inst.i.tuted an M.C. in the person of Captain Webster--Nash's predecessor--whose main act of glory was in setting up gambling as a public amus.e.m.e.nt. It remained for Nash to make the place what it afterwards was, when Chesterfield could lounge in the Pump-room and take snuff with the Beau; when Sarah of Marlborough, Lord and Lady Hervey, the Duke of Wharton, Congreve, and all the little-great of the day thronged thither rather to kill time with less ceremony than in London, than to cure complaints more or less imaginary.

The doctors were only less numerous than the sharpers; the place was still uncivilized; the company smoked and lounged without etiquette, and played without honour: the place itself lacked all comfort, all elegance, and all cleanliness.

Upon this delightful place, the avatar of the G.o.d of Etiquette, personified in Mr. Richard Nash, descended somewhere about the year 1705, for the purpose of regenerating the barbarians. He alighted just at the moment that one of the doctors we have alluded to, in a fit of disgust at some slight on the part of the town, was threatening to destroy its reputation, or, as he politely expressed it, 'to throw a toad into the spring.' The Bathonians were alarmed and in consternation, when young Nash, who must have already distinguished himself as a macaroni, stepped forward and offered to render the angry physician impotent. 'We'll charm his toad out again with music,' quoth he. He evidently thought very little of the watering-place, after his town experiences, and prepared to treat it accordingly. He got up a band in the Pump-room, brought thither in this manner the healthy as well as the sick, and soon raised the renown of Bath as a resort for gaiety as well as for mineral waters. In a word, he displayed a surprising talent for setting everything and everybody to rights, and was, therefore, soon elected, by tacit voting, the King of Bath.

He rapidly proved his qualifications for the position. First he secured his Orphean harmony by collecting a band-subscription, which gave two guineas a-piece to six performers; then he engaged an official pumper for the Pump-room; and lastly, finding that the bathers still gathered under a booth to drink their tea and talk their scandal, he induced one Harrison to build a.s.sembly-rooms, guaranteeing him three guineas a week to be raised by subscription.

All this demanded a vast amount of impudence on Mr. Nash's part, and this he possessed to a liberal extent. The subscriptions flowed in regularly, and Nash felt his power increase with his responsibility. So, then, our minor monarch resolved to be despotic, and in a short time laid down laws for the guests, which they obeyed most obsequiously. Nash had not much wit, though a great deal of a.s.surance, but these laws were his _chef-d'oeuvre_. Witness some of them:--

1. 'That a visit of ceremony at first coming and another at going away, are all that are expected or desired by ladies of quality and fas.h.i.+on--except impertinents.

4. 'That no person takes it ill that any one goes to another's play or breakfast, and not theirs--except captious nature.

5. 'That no gentleman give his ticket for the b.a.l.l.s to any but gentlewomen. N.B.--Unless he has none of his acquaintance.

6. 'That gentlemen crowding before the ladies at the ball, show ill manners; and that none do so for the future--except such as respect n.o.body but themselves.

9. 'That the younger ladies take notice how many eyes observe them.

N.B.--This does not extend to the _Have-at-alls_.

10. 'That all whisperers of lies and scandal be taken for their authors.'

Really this law of Nash's must have been repealed some time or other at Bath. Still more that which follows:--

11. 'That repeaters of such lies and scandal be shunned by all company, except such as have been guilty of the same crime.'

There is a certain amount of satire in these Lycurgus statutes that shows Nash in the light of an observer of society; but, query, whether any frequenter of Bath would not have devised as good?

The dances of those days must have been somewhat tedious. They began with a series of minuets, in which, of course, only one couple danced at a time, the most distinguished opening the ball. These solemn performances lasted about two hours, and we can easily imagine that the rest of the company were delighted when the country dances, which included everybody, began. The ball opened at six; the country dances began at eight: at nine there was a lull for the gentlemen to offer their partners tea; in due course the dances were resumed, and at eleven Nash held up his hand to the musicians, and under no circ.u.mstances was the ball allowed to continue after that hour. Nash well knew the value of early hours to invalids, and he would not destroy the healing reputation of Bath for the sake of a little more pleasure. On one occasion the Princess Amelia implored him to allow one dance more. The despot replied, that his laws were those of Lycurgus, and could not be abrogated for any one. By this we see that the M.C. was already an autocrat in his kingdom.

Nor is it to be supposed that his majesty's laws were confined to such merely professional arrangements. Not a bit of it; in a very short time his impudence gave him undenied right of interference with the coats and gowns, the habits and manners, even the daily actions of his subjects, for so the visitors at Bath were compelled to become. _Si parvis componere magna recibit_, we may admit that the rise of Nash and that of Napoleon were owing to similar causes. The French emperor found France in a state of disorder, with which sensible people were growing more and more disgusted; he offered to restore order and propriety; the French hailed him, and gladly submitted to his early decrees; then, when he had got them into the habit of obedience, he could make what laws he liked, and use his power without fear of opposition. The Bath emperor followed the same course, and it may be asked whether it does not demand as great an amount of courage, a.s.surance, perseverance, and administrative power to subdue several hundreds of English ladies and gentlemen as to rise supreme above some millions of French republicans. Yet Nash experienced less opposition than Napoleon; Nash reigned longer, and had no infernal machine prepared to blow him up.

Everybody was delighted with the improvements in the Pump-room, the b.a.l.l.s, the promenades, the chairmen--the _Rouge_ ruffians of the mimic kingdom--whom he reduced to submission, and therefore n.o.body complained when Emperor Nash went further, and made war upon the white ap.r.o.ns of the ladies and the boots of the gentlemen. The society was in fact in a very barbarous condition at the time, and people who came for pleasure liked to be at ease. Thus ladies lounged into the b.a.l.l.s in their riding-hoods or morning dresses, gentlemen in boots, with their pipes in their mouths. Such atrocities were intolerable to the late frequenter of London society, and in his imperious arrogance, the new monarch used actually to pull off the white ap.r.o.ns of ladies who entered the a.s.sembly-rooms with that _degage_ article, and throw them upon the back seats. Like the French emperor, again, he treated high and low in the same manner, and when the d.u.c.h.ess of Queensberry appeared in an ap.r.o.n, coolly pulled it off, and told her it was only fit for a maid-servant.

Her grace made no resistance.

The men were not so submissive; but the M.C. turned them into ridicule, and whenever a gentleman appeared at the a.s.sembly-rooms in boots, would walk up to him, and in a loud voice remark, 'Sir, I think you have forgot your horse.' To complete his triumph, he put the offenders into a song called 'Trentinella's Invitation to the a.s.sembly.'

'Come, one and all, To Hoyden Hall, For there's the a.s.sembly this night: None but proud fools, Mind manners and rules; We Hoydens do decency slight.

'Come trollops and slatterns, c.o.c.kt hats and white ap.r.o.ns; This best our modesty suits: For why should not we In a dress be as free As Hogs-Norton squires in boots?'

and as this was not enough, got up a puppet-show of a sufficient coa.r.s.eness to suit the taste of the time, in which the practice of wearing boots was satirized.

His next onslaught was upon that of carrying swords; and in this respect Nash became a public benefactor, for in those days, though Chesterfield was the writer on etiquette, people were not well-bred enough to keep their tempers, and rivals for a lady's hand at a minuet, or gamblers who disputed over their cards, invariably settled the matter by an option between suicide or murder under the polite name of duel. The M.C. wisely saw that these affairs would bring Bath in bad repute, and determined to supplant the rapier by the less dangerous cane. In this he was for a long time opposed, until a notorious torchlight duel between two gamblers, of whom one was run through the body, and the other, to show his contrition, turned Quaker, brought his opponents to a sense of the danger of a weapon always at hand; and henceforth the sword was abolished.

These points gained, the autocrat laid down rules for the employment of the visitors' time, and these, from setting the fas.h.i.+on to some, soon became a law to all. The first thing to be done was, sensibly enough, the _ostensible_ object of their residence in Bath, the use of the baths. At an early hour four l.u.s.ty chairmen waited on every lady to carry her, wrapped in flannels, in

'A little black box, just the size of a coffin,'

to one of the five baths. Here, on entering, an attendant placed beside her a floating tray, on which were set her handkerchief, bouquet, and _snuff-box_, for our great-great-grandmothers _did_ take snuff; and here she found her friends in the same bath of naturally hot water. It was, of course, a reunion for society on the plea of health; but the early hours and exercise secured the latter, whatever the baths may have done.

A walk in the Pump-room, to the music of a tolerable band, was the next measure; and there, of course, the gentlemen mingled with the ladies. A coffee-house was ready to receive those of either s.e.x; for that was a time when madame and miss lived a great deal in public, and English people were not ashamed of eating their breakfast in public company.

These breakfasts were often enlivened by concerts paid for by the rich and enjoyed by all.

Supposing the peac.o.c.ks now to be dressed out and to have their tails spread to the best advantage, we next find some in the public promenades, others in the reading-rooms, the ladies having their clubs as well as the men; others riding; others, perchance, already gambling.

Mankind and womankind then dined at a reasonable hour, and the evening's amus.e.m.e.nts began early. Nash insisted on this, knowing the value of health to those, and they were many at that time, who sought Bath on its account. The b.a.l.l.s began at six, and took place every Tuesday and Friday, private b.a.l.l.s filling up the vacant nights. About the commencement of his reign, a theatre was built, and whatever it may have been, it afterwards became celebrated as the nursery of the London stage, and now, _O tempo pa.s.sato!_ is almost abandoned. It is needless to add that the gaming-tables were thronged in the evenings.

It was at them that Nash made the money which sufficed to keep up his state, which was vulgarly regal. He drove about in a chariot, flaming with heraldry, and drawn by six grays, with outriders, running footmen, and all the appendages which made an impression on the vulgar minds of the visitors of his kingdom. His dress was magnificent; his gold lace unlimited, his coats ever new; his hat alone was always of the same colour--_white_; and as the emperor Alexander was distinguished by his purple tunic and Brummell by his bow, Emperor Nash was known all England over by his white hat.

It is due to the King of Bath to say that, however much he gained, he always played fair. He even patronized young players, and after fleecing them, kindly advised them to play no more. When he found a man fixed upon ruining himself, he did his best to keep him from that suicidal act. This was the case with a young Oxonian, to whom he had lost money, and whom he invited to supper, in order to give him his parental advice.

The fool would not take the Beau's counsel and 'came to grief.' Even n.o.blemen sought his protection. The Duke of Beaufort entered on a compact with him to save his purse, if not his soul. He agreed to pay Nash ten thousand guineas, whenever he lost the same amount at a sitting. It was a comfortable treaty for our Beau, who accordingly watched his grace. Yet it must be said, to Nash's honour, that he once saved him from losing eleven thousand, when he had already lost eight, by reminding him of his compact. Such was play in those days! It is said that the duke had afterwards to pay the fine, from losing the stipulated sum at Newmarket.

He displayed as much honesty with the young Lord Townshend, who lost him his whole fortune, his estate, and even his carriage and horses--what madmen are gamblers!--and actually cancelled the whole debt, on condition my lord should pay him 5000 whenever he chose to claim it. To Nash's honour it must be said that he never came down upon the n.o.bleman during his life. He claimed the sum from his executors, who paid it.--'Honourable to both parties.'

But an end was put to the gaming at Bath and everywhere else--_except in a royal palace_, and Nash swore that, as he was a king, Bath came under the head of the exceptions--by an Act of Parliament. Of course Nash and the sharpers who frequented Bath--and their name was Legion--found means to evade this law for a time, by the invention of new games. But this could not last, and the Beau's fortune went with the death of the dice.

Still, however, the very prohibition increased the zest for play for a time, and Nash soon discovered that a private table was more comfortable than a public one. He entered into an arrangement with an old woman at Bath, in virtue of which he was to receive a fourth share of the profits. This was probably not the only 'h.e.l.l'-keeping transaction of his life, and he had once before quashed an action against a cheat in consideration of a handsome bonus; and, in fact, there is no saying what amount of dirty work Nash would not have done for a hundred or so, especially when the game of the table was shut up to him. The man was immensely fond of money; he liked to show his gold-laced coat and superb new waistcoat in the Grove, the Abbey Ground, and Bond Street, and to be known as Le Grand Nash. But, on the other hand, he did not love money for itself, and never h.o.a.rded it. It is, indeed, something to Nash's honour, that he died poor. He delighted, in the poverty of his mind, to display his great thick-set person to the most advantage; he was as vain as any fop, without the affectation of that character, for he was always blunt and free-spoken, but, as long as he had enough to satisfy his vanity, he cared nothing for mere wealth. He had generosity, though he neglected the precept about the right hand and the left, and showed some ostentation in his charities. When a poor ruined fellow at his elbow saw him win at a throw 200, and murmured 'How happy that would make me!' Nash tossed the money to him, and said, 'Go and be happy then.' Probably the witless beau did not see the delicate satire implied in his speech. It was only the triumph of a gamester. On other occasions he collected subscriptions for poor curates, and so forth, in the same spirit, and did his best towards founding an hospital, which has since proved of great value to those afflicted with rheumatic gout. In the same spirit, though himself a gamester, he often attempted to win young and inexperienced boys, who came to toss away their money at the rooms, from seeking their own ruin; and, on the whole, there was some goodness of heart in this gold-laced bear.

That he was a bear there are anecdotes enough to show, and whether true or not, they sufficiently prove what the reputation of the man must have been. Thus, when a lady, afflicted with a curvature of the spine, told him that 'She had come _straight_ from London that day,' Nash replied with utter heartlessness, 'Then, ma'am, you've been d.a.m.nably warpt on the road.' The lady had her revenge, however, for meeting the beau one day in the Grove, as she toddled along with her dog, and being impudently asked by him if she knew the name of Tobit's dog, she answered quickly, 'Yes, sir, his name was Nash, and a most impudent dog he was too.'

It is due to Nash to state that he made many attempts to put an end to the perpetual system of scandal, which from some hidden cause seems always to be connected with mineral springs; but as he did not banish the old maids, of course he failed. Of the young ladies and their reputation he took a kind of paternal care, and in that day they seem to have needed it, for even at nineteen, those who had any money to lose, staked it at the tables with as much gusto as the wrinkled, puckered, greedy-eyed 'single woman,' of a certain or uncertain age. Nash protected and cautioned them, and even gave them the advantage of his own unlimited experience. Witness, for instance, the care he took of 'Miss Sylvia,' a lovely heiress who brought her face and her fortune to enslave some and enrich others of the loungers of Bath. She had a terrible love of hazard, and very little prudence, so that Nash's good offices were much needed in the case. The young lady soon became the standing toast at all the clubs and suppers, and lovers of her, or her ducats, crowded round her; but though at that time she might have made a brilliant match, she chose, as young women will do, to fix her affections upon one of the worst men in Bath, who, naturally enough, did not return them. When this individual, as a climax to his misadventures, was clapt into prison, the devoted young creature gave the greater part of her fortune in order to pay off his debts, and falling into disrepute from this act of generosity, which was, of course, interpreted after a worldly fas.h.i.+on, she seems to have lost her honour with her fame, and the fair Sylvia took a position which could not be creditable to her. At last the poor girl, weary of slights, and overcome with shame, took her silk sash and hanged herself. The terrible event made a nine hours'--_not_ nine days'--sensation in Bath, which was too busy with mains and aces to care about the fate of one who had long sunk out of its circles.

When Nash reached the zenith of his power, the adulation he received was somewhat of a parody on the flattery of courtiers. True, he had his bards from Grub Street who sang his praises, and he had letters to show from Sarah of Marlborough and others of that calibre, but his chief wors.h.i.+ppers were cooks, musicians, and even imprisoned highwaymen--one of whom disclosed the secrets of the craft to him--who wrote him dedications, letters, poems, and what not. The good city of Bath set up his statue, and did Newton and Pope[20] the great honour of playing 'supporters' to him, which elicited from Chesterfield some well-known lines:--

'This statue placed the busts between Adds to the satire strength; Wisdom and Wit are little seen, But Folly at full length.'

Meanwhile his private character was none of the best. He had in early life had one attachment, besides that unfortunate affair for which his friends had removed him from Oxford, and in that had behaved with great magnanimity. The young lady had honestly told him that he had a rival; the Beau sent for him, settled on her a fortune equal to that her father intended for her, and himself presented her to the favoured suitor. Now, however, he seems to have given up all thoughts of matrimony, and gave himself up to mistresses, who cared more for his gold than for himself.

It was an awkward conclusion to Nash's generous act in that one case, that before a year had pa.s.sed, the bride ran away with her husband's footman; yet, though it disgusted him with ladies, it does not seem to have cured him of his attachment to the s.e.x in general.

In the height of his glory Nash was never ashamed of receiving adulation. He was as fond of flattery as Le Grand Monarque--and he paid for it too--whether it came from a prince or a chair-man. Every day brought him some fresh meed of praise in prose or verse, and Nash was always delighted.

But his sun was to set in time. His fortune went when gaming was put down, for he had no other means of subsistence. Yet he lived on: he had not the good sense to die; and he reached the patriarchal age of eighty-seven. In his old age he was not only garrulous, but bragging: he told stories of his exploits, in which he, Mr. Richard Nash, came out as the first swordsman, swimmer, leaper, and what not. But by this time people began to doubt Mr. Richard Nash's long-bow, and the yarns he spun were listened to with impatience. He grew rude and testy in his old age; suspected Quin, the actor, who was living at Bath, of an intention to supplant him; made coa.r.s.e, impertinent repartees to the visitors at that city, and in general raised up a dislike to himself. Yet, as other monarchs have had their eulogists in sober mind, Nash had his in one of the most depraved; and Anstey, the low-minded author of 'The New Bath Guide,' panegyrized him a short time after his death in the following verses:--