Key to the Cock-fight.
The Colonel is represented as in the act of handing a cock, which he has backed heavily, in opposition to a bird belonging to the Nawab, who is portrayed in a loose undress on the opposite side of the pit.
Colonel Mordaunt's taste for cock-fighting had, of course, originally been acquired in England, where this somewhat brutal sport would appear to have been most popular towards the middle of the eighteenth century. At that time it was no unusual circumstance to insert clauses in the leases of farms and cottages, which ensured the right of walking a certain number of game-cocks. As the century waned the cockpit began rather to fall into disrepute, but about the years 1793-1794 a revival occurred. Great patrons of cock-fighting were Lord Lonsdale (when Sir James Lowther); the Duke of Northumberland, who fought regular annual mains against Mr. Fenwick at Alnwick and Hexham, as did Lord Mexborough with Sir P. Warburton and Mr. Halton at Manchester; the Duke of Hamilton with Sir H.G. Liddell at Newcastle, and Lord Derby with Mr. Wharton at Preston.
Amongst other lovers of cock-fighting were Colonel Lowther, Mr. Holford, Mr. Bullock, Captain Dennisthorpe, and Mr. George Onslow, out-ranger[9] of Windsor Forest, who was known as "Cocking George."
In 1793 the Cock Pit Royal, St. James's Park, was the scene of more subscription matches than had occurred for some years before, an extra battle, fought on the 13th of December between two red cocks belonging to Colonel Lowther and Vauxhall Clarke for forty guineas, causing particular excitement. Throughout this combat the odds were constantly varying, till Colonel Lowther's cock was suddenly struck down dead at a moment when odds of four and five to one were being laid upon his opponent.
One of the most horrible anecdotes connected with cock-fighting was that of a certain Mr. Ardesoif, the son of a rich cheesemonger, who was at one time well-known in the streets of London, it having been his peculiar hobby to drive his phaeton through those thoroughfares which were the most crowded with traffic. Mr. Ardesoif lived at Tottenham, where he kept a number of game-cocks. One of these birds having refused to fight, the cruel owner savagely had him roasted to death, whilst entertaining his friends. The company, alarmed by the dreadful shrieks of the poor victim, interfered, but were resisted by Ardesoif, who threatened death to any who should oppose him; and in a storm of raging and vindictive delirium, and uttering the most horrid imprecations, he dropped down dead.