SUMMER AMUSEMENT, OR A GAME AT BOWLS.
August 20, 1800. [Summer Amusement; or, a Game at Bowls.] Published by T. Rowlandson, 1 James's Street, Adelphi.—It has been a custom immemorial to laugh at the exertions which were made by our ancestors to obtain rational open-air recreation. The fashionable part of society have, for once, found congenial allies in the wits. The papers which doubtless obtained the most popular reception in their day, since they laughed at the simple citizens 'on pleasure bent,' and held up their relaxations to a ridicule which was often neither subtle nor polished, were the essays in the Spectator, Tatler, Guardian, Humourist, &c., which made fun of the countrified loungings of the Londoners. The squibs, in the shape of poetical broadsheets and songs of the Stuart era, against sylvan aspirations, were but re-echoed by the bright and cultivated humourists who flourished when 'Anna ruled the realm.' Sturdy Hogarth, with his pictures, brought the commonplace pleasures—although he was addicted to them with no half-spirit himself—of his neighbours into ludicrous prominence. The Connoisseur, World, Mirror, Adventurer, Observer, Lounger, Looker-on, and even Johnson's Rambler, are particularly caustic on the comic side of humanity, as seen in their out-of-door pastimes. As to the days of transition, when the early Georgian generation was being rapidly submerged and effaced by the tide of progression, both writers and caricaturists combined to satirise cockney jauntings unmercifully. Gillray, Rowlandson, Collings, Boyle, Bunbury, Deighton, Woodward, Nixon, Newton, and a swarm of amateur followers, were always ready to make fun of suburban excursions; such productions were certain to obtain fame for the designers, and a ready patronage at the hands of a public which encouraged similar everyday irony.
It seems, however, now the suburbs have disappeared, where tea-gardens were once abundant—to which, armed with lanterns and in groups, for better security against the knights of the road, footpads, and similar dangers which were then rife, our forefathers repaired with light hearts, released from the culture of Mammon and money-grubbing—that we have lost a great deal which modern improvements are powerless to restore.
A little generation back there were still relics of past pleasure haunts, a Sluice House, a Hornsey Wood House, and numberless similar resorts for the dwellers in Babylon, who sighed to turn, for a brief afternoon of diversion, their respectable backs on groves of brick, and to regale their pastoral-longing eyes with a semblance of the country. Now the monster metropolis, with unsparing strides, has finally absorbed such patches of verdure, as made homely retreats on red-letter holidays; and life is considerably restricted, as regards the variety which an hour's jaunt could introduce into the prosaic current of yearly existence, as far as the boundaries of the giant city are concerned.
A great deal could be written on the defunct pleasure-gardens which once enlivened the outskirts; but their glories are departed, or at best preserved in the satires, literary and artistic, which contemporary humourists levelled at the Georgic-loving citizens who frequented them. Such a suburban retreat, with the motley crowds who disported themselves thereat, is graphically reproduced in Rowlandson's plate of [Summer Amusement]. Much of the delight was prosaic and toilsome; but, seemingly, good fun was to be had, and people could lay aside their conventional rigidity for once and awhile, when fine weather and the pleasant season tempted them to stray, and leave the everlasting counting-house at home, for a game at bowls and a little wholesome relaxation. The various groups found in the picture are well conceived. Two games are proceeding, into which cits, of various degrees, are throwing their entire energies. The whimsical accompaniments connected with 'taking tea in the arbour' are faithfully seized. The soberer elders are crowding the hospitable 'house of call.' Round the foremost table is gathered a convivial party; the worthy souls are draining a parting bowl, before commencing their return journey, for which the lantern is set on the ground in prudent preparation. A little toasting is going on at the next table, and beyond that an arcadian flirtation is in progress, with various incidents transpiring around, such as the observant philosopher might have noted in 1800, without travelling very far out of his way.
August 30, 1800. Gratification of the Senses à la mode Française.—(Seeing, Tasting, Hearing, Smelling, Feeling.)
October 1. The Newspaper. G. M. Woodward invt., Rowlandson sculp. Published by R. Ackermann.
October 29, 1800. Grotesque borders for Rooms and Halls.—Published October 25 and 29, 1800, by R. Ackermann, 101 Strand. Woodward del., Rowlandson sculp.