emphasis in every corner of the room; the tables were struck with drunken fists till the tumult became a perfect storm; the master of the place raps the table with an auctioneer’s hammer—“Silence, gentlemen, if you please, Mr --- will sing a comic song;” and immediately a man in a beggar’s costume, and with the face of an idiot, jumps upon the stage. His appearance was a signal for a whirlwind of applause. He sang, with accompanying action, some dozen verses of doggerel, remarkable for obscenity and imbecility. You looked around, but not a blush did you see in that crowded room; not one single head was held down in shame; not one high-spirited gentleman rushed indignantly from the place. On the contrary, the singer was greeted with the most lavish expression of applause, continued so loudly and so long that again the proprietor had to announce, “Mr --- will sing another comic song.” But this time the comic singer would not dress for his part, and you saw a young, good-looking, well-dressed, gentlemanly fellow voluntarily degrading himself for the pleasure of men more degraded still. You tell me the comic singer is a happy fellow, that he gets six guineas a-week, that he lives in a nice little cottage in
the Hampstead-road. I know better than you; the man I write of, after having been the attraction of the Cave of Harmony for years, after having been feasted by the nobility and gentry, after having led a career of pleasure on the most extravagant scale, will go down yet young as a beggar to one of our sea-port towns, and, after craving in vain a refuge from the winter’s cold and a crust of bread, will die in the workhouse, and be buried in a pauper’s grave. How many of the gay young fellows now around us will have a similar termination to their career! I never can pass the Cave of Harmony without thinking of the comic singer as last I saw him—in the very flush of health and life, stimulated by wine and applause, little dreaming of the workhouse in which he was so soon to beg for room to die. But this exhibition is of the past,—the place is reformed; and how it is patronized is clear, when I state that on the night of the marriage of the Princess Royal, there were consumed in it 21 dozen kidneys, 478 chops, 280 Welsh rabbits, 1500 glasses of stout, and a hogshead of pale ale.
DISCUSSION CLUBS.
It is the condition of a public-house that it must do a good business some way or other. Mr Hinton, who has just got his license for Highbury Barn, says the dining apartment fell off and he was obliged to institute Soirées Dansantes. Sometimes the publican gets a female dressed up in a Bloomer costume; sometimes he has for his barman a giant, or a dwarf, or an Albino, or a Kaffir chief—actually as an attraction to decent people to go and drink their pot of beer. I find the following advertisement in the Morning Advertiser:—
“The Sheep-eater of Hindostan.—To be seen, the Sheep-eater of Hindostan, representing an exhibition which took place on the 3rd of March, 1796, before Colonel Patrick Douglas and other officers of a battalion of Native Infantry, and a great concourse of the inhabitants of the military station of Futtehghur. It is engraved from a sketch, taken on the spot by a native artist, and under the inspection of Major-General Hardwicke, F.R.S. The Sheep-eater was a native of India, about thirty years of age, five feet nine inches high, slender, well formed, and rather muscular. He was attended by a very old man, whom he called his father or preceptor, termed by the natives Gooroo or Priest, who stated he had formerly followed the same practice. He was above the ordinary stature of the natives of India, and wore his hair, which was of great length, coiled into the form of a turban; and his beard was twisted like a rope, and nearly reached his feet, being five feet eight inches in length. The exhibitor began his operation by raising the sheep from the ground with his teeth. He then threw the animal on its back, and, with his teeth and hands only, separated the limbs, and stript the flesh from the bones. After mixing dust with the meat, by rubbing it on the ground, in that dirty state he swallowed what he tore off. The last part of the operation was chewing the leaves of a plant, the local name of which is Madaar (asclepias gigantea), and the milky juice, which is of a very corrosive nature, he swallowed. Having made a collection of money, and the assemblage of people being much increased, he offered to eat a second sheep, and actually commenced the operation as before. It may be proper to observe, that the sheep in most parts of India are as small as the Welsh sheep of Great Britain. No. 1. represents lifting the sheep from the ground with his teeth only. 2. Having thrown the sheep on its back, he extends the limbs, preparatory to No. 3. 3. Ripping the animal open from the flank to the breast. 4. Having removed the intestines, &c, he buries his head in the body, to drink the blood collected. 5. Exhibiting his face, after this sanguinary draught. 6. Having devoured every portion of flesh from the bones, he chews the plant Madaar. 7. After changing his waist-cloth, he returns with his Gooroo, or preceptor, and offers to eat the second sheep, for the satisfaction of the increased number of spectators.”
I do not give the name of the spirited proprietor, but in his advertisement he declares he intends exhibiting it over the bar for a short time gratuitously. This is rich; it is like the doctor’s advice gratis.
Now in the same manner the publicans provide a weekly discussion meeting for that part of the public that loves to hear itself speak. There
is one at the Belvidere, Pentonville; another at the Horns, Kennington. Fleet-street is much favoured. There are the Temple Forum, the Cogers’ Hall, and another large room in Shoe-lane. These are gratuitous, like the picture in the above advertisement—that is, you are expected to sit and drink all night. The most celebrated one is that which meets not far from the Temple, presided over by the editor of a Sunday paper, and assisted by several reporters connected with the daily journals. One of them not long since contested an Irish borough on Protestant principles, but unfortunately, instead of being returned, found himself in gaol for election expenses. Besides these, there are many third and fourth-rate literary men—a class, I fear (I speak of the minors), the most braggart, lying, and needy under heaven—men who are going to do wonders, but who never do—whose success, if such a term may be applied to their career, arises simply from their power of brag, and from the possession of an enviable amount of self-esteem. Then there are briefless barristers, but too happy to have an opportunity of airing their dictionaries, and tradesmen, and clerks, all fancying that there is no need why they should hide
their talents under a napkin. Still these places do not flourish, and there are more bad speeches made than good ones. You are cooped up in an inconvenient apartment, suffocated by tobacco-smoke, and very unpleasantly affected by the beer and gin-and-water which every one feels bound to consume. The waiter is in the room, and you are expected to give your orders. The speaking is a secondary consideration. The first thing you are required to do is to drink. I have how in my mind’s eye a young fellow who was a great man at one of these places. He was a clerk with limited means, but he came to these places night after night, and drank and spent his money freely. It is the old tale over again. He was intrusted with his employer’s cash. He applied some of it to liquidate his expenses. He was unable to replace it. Discovery was made at last; he is now in Newgate, and his wife—for he was just married—is breaking her young heart with shame and want. The curse of these public-houses is that they lead men into expense and reduce them into poverty, if they do not almost necessitate crime. A discussion is all very well, and the habit of being able to get up and say a few words when occasion requires pertinent and
apropos is invaluable, but to acquire that habit it is scarcely worth while to sit all night toping, while Smithers is playing old gooseberry with his H’s, or O’Flaherty raving of the wrongs of the Green Isle. The questions discussed are generally such as are peculiar to the time. Was Lord Cardigan a hero? Does Sir Benjamin Hall deserve well of the public for his conduct with reference to Sunday bands? Does the Palmerston cabinet deserve the support of the country? Would Lord John Russell’s scheme of national education, if carried out, be a public benefit? Let men talk on these subjects if they will, and as long as they will, but I think they will think more clearly, and talk better, and come sooner to a rational decision, if they do not drink. I am sure I have seen the audience and the orators more inflamed by beer than by eloquence, and when turned out into the street after a long sitting, many, I imagine, have seen a couple of moons and double the usual allowance of lamps and police. The worst of it is, that after the discussion is over, there will be always a few stop to have a bit of supper and another glass. I remember, just as the war broke out, I was at one of the places to which I have already