THE PAVILION.
One of the best stories connected with the Pavilion is that told so well in the “Four Georges”:
“And now I have one more story of the bacchanalian sort, in which Clarence and York and the very highest personage in the realm, the great Prince Regent, all play parts.
“The feast was described to me by a gentleman who was present at the scene. In Gilray’s caricatures, and amongst Fox’s jolly associates, there figures a great nobleman, the Duke of Norfolk, called Jockey of Norfolk in his time, and celebrated for his table exploits. He had quarrelled with the Prince, like the rest of the Whigs; but a sort of reconciliation had taken place, and now, being a very old man, the Prince invited him to dine and sleep at the Pavilion, and the old Duke drove over from his Castle of Arundel with his famous equipage of grey horses, still remembered in Sussex.
“The Prince of Wales had concocted with his royal brothers a notable scheme for making the old man drunk. Every person at table was enjoined to drink wine with the Duke—a challenge which the old toper did not refuse. He soon began to see that there was a conspiracy against him; he drank glass for glass: he overthrew many of the brave. At last the first gentleman of Europe proposed bumpers of brandy. One of the royal brothers filled a great glass for the Duke. He stood up and tossed off the drink. ‘Now,’ says he, ‘I will have my carriage and go home.’
“The Prince urged upon him his previous promise to sleep under the roof where he had been so generously entertained. ‘No,’ he said; ‘he had had enough of such hospitality. A trap had been set for him; he would leave the place at once, and never enter its doors more.’
“The carriage was called, and came; but, in the half-hour’s interval, the liquor had proved too potent for the old man; his host’s generous purpose was answered, and the Duke’s old grey head lay stupefied on the table. Nevertheless, when his post-chaise was announced, he staggered to it as well as he could, and, stumbling in, bade the postilions drive to Arundel.
“They drove him for half an hour round and round the Pavilion lawn; the poor old man fancied he was going home.