London Club Life. John Timbs

he had dined, when the Club-room door was opened, and the Laureate was introduced, he was saluted with loud and joyous acclamation of 'O King Coll! Come in, King Coll!' and 'Welcome, welcome, King Colley!' And this kind of gratulation, Mr. Victor thought, was very gracious and very honourable."

      In the Rules quoted by Mr. Cunningham, from the Club-books, we find that in 1780, a dinner was ready every day during the sitting of Parliament, at a reckoning of 12s. per head; in 1797, at 10s. 6d. per head, malt liquors, biscuits, oranges, apples, and olives included; hot suppers provided at 8s. per head; and cold meat, oysters, etc., at 4s., malt liquor only included. And, "that Every Member who plays at Chess, Draughts, or Backgammon do pay One Shilling each time of playing by daylight, and half-a-crown each by candlelight."

      White's was from the beginning principally a gaming Club. The play was mostly at hazard and faro; no member was to hold a faro Bank. Whist was comparatively harmless. Professional gamblers, who lived by dice and cards, provided they were free from the imputation of cheating, procured admission to White's. It was a great supper-house, and there was play before and after supper, carried on to a late hour and heavy amounts. Lord Carlisle lost 10,000l. in one night, and was in debt to the house for the whole. He tells Selwyn of a set, in which at one point of the game, stood to win 50,000l. Sir John Bland, of Kippax Park, who shot himself in 1755, as we learn from Walpole, flirted away his whole fortune at hazard. "He t'other night exceeded what was lost by the late Duke of Bedford, having at one period of the night, (though he recovered the greater part of it,) lost two-and-thirty thousand pounds."

      Lord Mountford came to a tragic end through his gambling. He had lost money; feared to be reduced to distress; asked for a Government appointment, and determined to throw the die of life or death, on the answer he received from Court. The answer was unfavourable. He consulted several persons, indirectly at first, afterwards pretty directly—on the easiest mode of finishing life; invited a dinner-party for the day after; supped at White's, and played at whist till one o'clock of the New Year's morning. Lord Robert Bertie drank to him "a happy new year;" he clapped his hand strangely to his eyes. In the morning, he sent for a lawyer and three witnesses, executed his will; made them read it twice over, paragraph by paragraph; asked the lawyer if that will would stand good though a man were to shoot himself. Being assured it would, he said, "Pray stay, while I step into the next room,"—went into the next room, and shot himself.

      Walpole writes to Mann: "John Damier and his two brothers have contracted a debt, one can scarcely expect to be believed out of England—of 70,000l. … The young men of this age seem to make a law among themselves for declaring their fathers superannuated at fifty, and thus dispose of their estates as if already their own." "Can you believe that Lord Foley's two sons have borrowed money so extravagantly, that the interest they have contracted to pay, amounts to 18,000l. a year."

      Fox's love of play was frightful: his best friends are said to have been half-ruined in annuities, given by them as securities for him to the Jews. Five hundred thousand a year of such annuities, of Fox and his Society, were advertised to be sold, at one time: Walpole wondered what Fox would do when he had sold the estates of all his friends. Here are some instances of his desperate play. Walpole further notes that in the debate on the Thirty-nine Articles, February 6, 1772, Fox did not shine, "nor could it be wondered at. He had sat up playing at hazard at Almack's, from Tuesday evening the 4th, till five in the afternoon of Wednesday, 5th. An hour before he had recovered 12,000l. that he had lost, and by dinner, which was at five o'clock, he had ended losing 11,000l. On the Thursday, he spoke in the above debate; went to dinner at past eleven at night; from thence to White's, where he drank till seven the next morning; thence to Almack's, where he won 6,000l.; and between three and four in the afternoon he set out for Newmarket. His brother Stephen lost 11,000l. two nights after, and Charles 10,000l. more on the 13th; so that, in three nights, the two brothers, the eldest not twenty-five, lost 32,000l."

      Walpole and a party of friends, (Dick Edgecumbe, George Selwyn, and Williams,) in 1756, composed a piece of heraldic satire—a coat-of-arms for the two gaming-clubs at White's—which was "actually engraving from a very pretty painting of Edgecumbe, whom Mr. Chute, as Strawberry King at arms," appointed their chief herald-painter. The blazon is vert (for a card-table); three parolis proper on a chevron sable (for a hazard-table); two rouleaux in saltire between two dice proper, on a canton sable; a white ball (for election) argent. The supporters are an old and young knave of clubs; the crest, an arm out of an earl's coronet shaking a dice-box; and the motto, "Cogit amor nummi." Round the arms is a claret-bottle ticket by way of order. The painting above mentioned by Walpole of "the Old and Young Club at Arthur's" was bought at the sale of Strawberry Hill by Arthur's Club-house for twenty-two shillings.

      At White's, the least difference of opinion invariably ended in a bet, and a book for entering the particulars of all bets was always laid upon the table; one of these, with entries of a date as early as 1744, Mr. Cunningham tells us, had been preserved. A book for entering bets is still laid on the table.

      In these betting books are to be found bets on births, deaths, and marriages; the length of a life, or the duration of a ministry; a placeman's prospect of a coronet; on the shock of an earthquake; or the last scandal at Ranelagh, or Madame Cornelys's. A man dropped down at the door of White's; he was carried into the house. Was he dead or not? The odds were immediately given and taken for and against. It was proposed to bleed him. Those who had taken the odds the man was dead, protested that the use of a lancet would affect the fairness of the bet.

      Walpole gives some of these narratives as good stories "made on White's." A parson coming into the Club on the morning of the earthquake of 1750, and hearing bets laid whether the shock was caused by an earthquake or the blowing-up of powder-mills, went away in horror, protesting they were such an impious set, that he believed if the last trump were to sound, they would bet "puppet-show against Judgment." Gilly Williams writes to Selwyn, 1764, "Lord Digby is very soon to be married to Miss Fielding." Thousands might have been won in this house (White's), on his Lordship not knowing that such a being existed.

      Mr. Cunningham tells us that "the marriage of a young lady of rank would occasion a bet of a hundred guineas, that she would give birth to a live child before the Countess of——, who had been married three or even more months before her. Heavy bets were pending, that Arthur, who was then a widower, would be married before a member of the Club of about the same age, and also a widower; and that Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, would outlive the old Duchess of Cleveland."

      "One of the youth at White's," writes Walpole to Mann, July 10, 1744, "has committed a murder, and intends to repeat it. He betted £1500 that a man could live twelve hours under water; hired a desperate fellow, sunk him in a ship, by way of experiment, and both ship and man have not appeared since. Another man and ship are to be tried for their lives, instead of Mr. Blake, the assassin."

      Walpole found at White's, a very remarkable entry in their very—very remarkable wager-book, which is still preserved. "Lord Mountford bets Sir John Bland twenty guineas that Nash outlives Cibber." "How odd," says Walpole, "that these two old creatures, selected for their antiquities, should live to see both their wagerers put an end to their own lives! Cibber is within a few days of eighty-four, still hearty, and clear, and well. I told him I was glad to see him look so well. 'Faith,' said he, 'it is very well that I look at all.'" Lord Mountford would have been the winner: Cibber died in 1757; Nash in 1761.

      Here is a nice piece of Selwyn's ready wit. He and Charles Townshend had a kind of wit combat together. Selwyn, it is said, prevailed; and Charles Townshend took the wit home in his carriage, and dropped him at White's. "Remember," said Selwyn, as they parted, "this is the first set-down you have given me to-day."

      "St. Leger," says Walpole, "was at the head of these luxurious heroes—he is the hero of all fashion. I never saw more dashing vivacity and absurdity with some flashes of parts. He had a cause the other day for ducking a sharper, and was going to swear; the judge said to him, 'I see, Sir, you are very ready to take an oath.' 'Yes, my Lord,' replied St. Leger, 'my father was a judge,'" St. Leger was a lively club member. "Rigby," writes the Duke of Bedford, July 2, 1751, "the town is grown extremely thin within this week, though White's continues numerous enough, with young people only, for Mr. St. Leger's vivacity,