There has been nothing like a good, fair account of this Autocrat of the Dandies.
Captain Jesse, who published two volumes of Memoirs about him some years ago, could
never have seen Brummell, and knew very little of
his life, character, and conversation; while the little he did know was only by hearsay.
Raikes’s account, just published (1856),
is by far the fairest I have seen, and yet it scarcely does justice to
Brummell’s wit and humour, and two or three things seem to
me incorrectly stated. Brummell ended his days at Caen, and would have
ended them in downright misery but for the Sœurs de Charité. The way in which he lost the
consulship was this. Being weary of Caen and of having nothing to do there, he represented
to Lord Palmerston that a British Consul was hardly
wanted in that place, and that he was very desirous of getting a change by being appointed
to some other place where there were English interests to attend to, and where he could be
useful and earn the salary he received from his country. Palmerston
abolished the Caen Consulship, but would not give Brummell another. If
Brummell had not confidently counted on being employed elsewhere,
he would never have written this letter to the Foreign Secretary. The pay at Caen was £300
a year; and when it was so suddenly suspended, the aged man of fashion, once the constant
companion of Royalty, was left penniless. There were some
| CHAP. XXVII] | THE DANDIES’ INFLUENCE | 267 |
As boy and youth I frequently saw Beau
Brummell in the parks and other regions of the West. Though an exquisite
dandy, he never seemed to me to be overdressed or stiff, or in any way guindé. His carriage was easy, free, and manly. He was
a remarkably well-made man, but his face was scarcely equal to his figure. I quite agree
with my friend Mountstuart Elphinstone that English
society owed a debt of gratitude to the dandies. When they triumphantly took the field, and
for a good many years previously, our young nobility and gentry adopted the dress, and too
often the language and manners, of the coach-box, stable, or turf. To be fashionable, was
to dress like a coachman or groom. I am quite old enough to remember how widely this
coarse, bad, vulgar taste prevailed. It was checked at about the time the Regency of
George,
| 268 | BEAU BRUMMELL | [CHAP. XXVII |
One of these tales was, for a long time, in everyone’s mouth. A wealthy, old-fashioned country squire, who had a son and heir to launch into the gay world, asked Brummell, one day, what he ought to allow young hopeful for his tailor’s bills, or for what annual sum the youngster might be well and fashionably dressed? “Oh!” said Brummell after some consideration, and with a very solemn countenance, “with the strictest economy—mind, I say the strictest economy—it may be done for £1,000 a year.”
I saw the Beau, in full feather, rather late one afternoon, in the spring of the year 1815, the day before I took my departure for Portugal. He was evidently just out of bed; or rather, quite fresh from the toilette. So late a sitter could hardly be an early riser. He used to say that, whether it was summer or winter, he always liked to have the morning well-aired before he got up.
A friend of W. S. Rose once gently reproved the Beau for passing so many of the daylight hours in bed.
“Dear me!” said Brummell. “Don’t you know that I am quite a reformed man?
Now, I always begin to rise with the first muffin bell!” The muffin bell is,
I believe, quite silenced through my friend Ben
Hawes and his London Street Police Bill, or Bills. At least, I never hear it
in the West End of London;
| CHAP. XXVII] | AT CALAIS | 269 |
The next time, being the last time of all, that I saw Brummell was at an hotel in Calais, in the autumn of 1820, as I was on my way to the south of Italy.
H. and A., two very considerable dandies of that day, who had crossed over with me from Dover, were pupils and almost idolaters of Brummell. They invited him to dinner, but he was engaged, if I remember right, with Scrope Davies, who had taken refuge in that dull old French town. However, he came in towards the small hours, and sat until long after sunrise.
There was a terrible change in other things besides the financial ones;
but still he was an elegant, striking man, and became very amusing and rather animated,
though he drank but moderately. At times, however, I thought I saw a look of sadness and
despondency. There was reason for it. At this moment he was cruelly embarrassed. Before
H. left for Paris, he was obliged to administer to some of
Brummell’s pressing wants, and
H. himself was rather “hard up.”
Brummell’s anecdotes were innumerable. They were all told
with admirable humour, and most of them with good nature. I can remember only two that were
spiteful, or calculated to give pain to deserving persons, and these two I shall certainly
not tell. After this symposium, I could understand a good deal of the secret of
Brummell’s extraordinary success and influence in the
highest society. He was a vast deal more than a mere dandy; he had wit as well as humour
and drollery, and the most perfect coolness and self-possession. He did not speak harshly
of his ci-devant friend the Regent, by this time
His Majesty George IV.; on the contrary, he related
several clever and two or three kind things of him, and gave him credit for a great deal of
natural ability and esprit. He confirmed what
Raikes and others have said of the
Prince’s extraordinary powers
| 270 | BEAU BRUMMELL | [CHAP. XXVII |
| CHAP. XXVII] | LAST DAYS IN FRANCE | 271 |
W. P. took him for a French gentleman of the old school, or for some retired diplomatist whose life had been spent in the highest society; but on making inquiry he was told that this was poor Beau Brummell, and that he was then “poor indeed.” W. P., being a remarkably quiet, modest, retiring person, made no attempt to draw him out; but he was interested by his distinguished manners, his humility, and apparent submission to his fate. Even the French frequenters of the table d’hôte, or most of them, seemed to be aware that poor Brummell, who could now scarcely pay for his cheap dinner, had lived in all the splendour of London, and had been for years the almost constant companion of the Regent. A few months later, my old friend, Major ——, then fast approaching the end of his days, put up at the same hotel, and went to dine at the same table d’hôte. In the doorway he ran against Brummell, whom he had not seen for twenty years or more. They had been rather intimate in the days of the Beau’s prepotency, for the Major had been a man of Fashion; and was always, and even to the last, when very penitent for past misdeeds, a man of pleasantry and wit.
They immediately recognized each other. “On est bien changé,” said Brummell, “voilà tout!” He uttered no complaint, but could not conceal his poverty and painful embarrassments. He was no longer the scoffer that he had been; he even seemed to entertain deep, religious convictions.
I believe that he died professing the faith of the Roman Catholic Church.
The last friends he had on earth were the Sisters of Charity. Raikes deplores that by his precept and example he demoralized and ruined,
in more senses than one, many young men of family and fortune. But is it not at least
probable that these extravagant, unthinking fellows would have run the road to ruin if they
had never known Brummell; and that, without his
acquaintance and tuition, their vices would only have been
| 272 | BEAU BRUMMELL | [CHAP. XXVII |
My friend, the late Elijah Impey,
son of the Indian Judge, the pet of Warren Hastings, had in his possession many original
letters which still more clearly demonstrated the political importance of the Beau’s
father. In one of these letters, the Governor-General, writing from Calcutta to a friend in
London, said, “See Mr. Brummell as soon as
you can, for he is active and intelligent, and has more influence than any man with
Lord North.” This Brummell
père left a good fortune to be divided among his
children. The Dandy, a younger son, had between £40,000 and £50,000 for his share.
Raikes says £30,000; but Brummell always named the larger sum, and Major
—— had reasons for believing that his account was the true one. The
Brummell family still hold a goodly estate in Essex, where they
were known, a few years ago, to my friend Dr. W.
Lyall, now Dean of Canterbury. In the winter of 1844, there was an old
gentleman staying at Hastings, and driving a four-in-hand. I saw him every day
| CHAP. XXVII] | SNUFF-BOXES | 273 |
This is like standing up in judgment against a deceased relative; the prosperous squire was reproducing and maintaining what the poor Dandy had put down. What would the Brummell have thought of these coats and capes? *The manners of both father and daughter appeared to be about as rough as their top-covering. Raikes correctly describes the Dandy’s taste, or rather passion, for costly or curious snuff-boxes. When the light wooden Scottish box, called the “Lawrence Kirk” box, with the ingenious, invisible hinge, first came out, he immediately purchased one. A day or two after, he was dining at Carlton House, where, among other personages, the Earl of Liverpool, the Premier, and rather a solemn, hard, severe man, was present. At the proper moment, the Beau introduced his new snuffbox, praising its lightness and prettiness, and doubting whether any of them would find out the hinge, or know how to open it.
The Regent tried, but soon gave it up, with a d——. When the others had tried and failed, the starch Prime Minister essayed his skill, taking up a knife to help him. “My lord!” cried Brummell. “Allow me to observe that’s not an oyster, but a snuff-box!” The Prince laughed out lustily; the Premier, looking grave, laid down the box, and said there was no opening it.
Brummell, like that late facetious Canon of St. Paul’s, the ever memorable Sydney Smith, had a
* From here, to nearly the end, to the phrase “married to the gout,” in M.’s handwriting. |
| 274 | BEAU BRUMMELL | [CHAP. XXVII |
Vain boast! Brummell went, having
previously communicated his intention to some of the Dandies who had been invited. As his
name was being telegraphed from the hall to the drawing-room, the Beau
tripped up the stairs. On the very threshold of the outer saloon stood
Thomson, as stern and as determined-looking as Gog or Magog. With his
blandest smile and with extended fingers, the Beau said, in dulcet
tone, “What! You here, Mr. Thomson? I did not expect the
pleasure of seeing you to-night. How is Mrs. Thomson? Ha! There
she is, and looking remarkably well!” Here he kissed the tip of his
exquisitely gloved hand to the lady, now close to the door, and returning his smile and
salute. Thomson was quite nonplussed, and before he could recover
himself or say a single syllable beyond “Sir!” the Marquis of
——, Lord ——, and two or three other Dandies,
crême de la crême, and devoted lieges of
Brummell, arrived and gathered round their chief, and advanced
with him into the drawing-room, bowing to the hostess, who was seen whispering to her
husband. She must have made it clear to Thomson that it would never do
to insult a man who had such great friends as Beau Brummell. When that
hero had spent half an hour ingoing round the saloons and in talking with those who he
thought worth talking to, he coolly went up to the host,
| CHAP. XXVII] | THE BEAU’S ASSURANCE | 275 |
The late Earl of W., Lady J.’s papa, but very unlike his always charming daughter, was scarcely a man to be joked with. He was proud, punctilious, starch, and grim, expecting more deference and peer-worship than he always obtained.
In filling their houses in the country with company, it was, as it still is, the custom of our magnates to reserve all the best chambers and dressing-rooms for the married couples, and to stow away the bachelors, anyhow, in the attics, or in the turrets, or wings. At Lord A.’s, Brummell had been put into an uncomfortable room, at the very top of the high house, more than once. He went to Lord A.’s in very cold Christmas weather, and before he was quite recovered from an attack of gout.
On his arrival the groom of the chambers was conducting him to his old
dormitory. “Stop!” cried the Beau. “I
cannot go up and down all these infernal stairs! Is there no room lower down? Here, for
example?” He threw open the door of a most comfortable, luxurious apartment,
and entered. “Sir,” said the groom of the chambers, “this is
reserved for the Earl of W., who is expected every
minute. The single gentlemen’s apartments are——”
| 276 | BEAU BRUMMELL | [CHAP. XXVII |
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