About the same time a townsman, who had amassed some fortune in trade, built a theatre just of that size in which the voice could be heard in all parts of the house without being strained, and the movements of the countenance seen without being distorted. While the town was thus improved by the enterprising liberality of its inhabitants, it derived no less advantage from the humour of one of those men who are contented to exhibit strong sense, in playing the fool well all the days of their lives. By this time more persons visited Bath in search of pleasure than of health, and these persons, among other amusements, had their public dances.—Now, though Englishmen have proved that they can go on peaceably, orderly, and well, under a free government, it was found utterly impossible to keep English women in order by any thing short of an absolute monarchy. Precedency, in these public meetings, was furiously contested,—because, in most instances, there was no criterion of rank whereby it could be decided; and points which are most doubtful, and, it may be added, most insignificant, are oftentimes the most warmly disputed: a perpetual Dictator for the realm of Fashion was necessary, and this person was the second who held the office. Nash was his name, and his fitness for the office is attested by the title of Beau, which is always prefixed to it;—Charlemagne, the Venerable Bede, and Beau Nash, being the only three persons whose names are always accompanied with the epithets which characterize them.
Beau Nash was as great as Charlemagne in his way, and in this respect greater, that the system which he established became permanent, and he transmitted an empire to his successors which has become yearly more and more extensive. He made laws to regulate when the company should assemble, and when they should separate; arranged the tactics of the dance; enacted the dress in which ladies should appear; and, if they ventured to disobey and come in without the wedding garment, made no scruple, whatever might be their rank, of turning them out. His strong sense and sarcastic humour kept them in awe. Such a man would in old times have been selected for the king's fool; he seems to have considered himself as standing in some such capacity to the Bath visitors, and made use of the privilege which the character allowed him. The follies of mankind were his food. He gambled, and his profits were such as enabled him to live expensively, and keep an equipage and a large retinue. This life terminated in its natural and righteous way. He became old and helpless, lived to stand in need of that charity which he had never withheld from the needy, but which none extended to him, and died poor, neglected, and miserable; the inhabitants of Bath rewarding his genius after the usual manner in which genius of a higher character is rewarded, by erecting a statue to the honour of the man whom they had suffered almost to starve.
Once, after his death, his loss was exemplified in a very remarkable manner. Two ladies of quality quarrelled in the ballroom. The rest of the company took part, some on one side, some on the other; Beau Nash was gone, and they stood in no awe of his successor: they became outrageous, a real battle-royal took place, and the floor was strewn with caps, lappets, curls and cushions, diamond pins and pearls.
Since the Parades were built every addition to the town has been made upon system, and with a view to its beauty: hence it presents the singular spectacle of a city of which the parts are uniform, yet the whole irregular;—a few old streets still remaining to make the others more remarkable by contrast. The adjoining hills supply a soft freestone, which is easily worked, and becomes harder when exposed to the air: its colour is very beautiful when fresh, but it is soon blackened by the soot from the earth-coal fires, which is indeed exceedingly annoying in all the large towns. Still, blackened stones produce a far better effect than blackened bricks. There is a Square of which the sides resemble so many palaces; ascend a handsome street from this, and you come into a Circus of like beauty, and near this is a Crescent built with equal, or even more magnificence, and overlooking the country. There are three of these crescents on the hills; one of them remains unfinished, because the ground in front has not been well secured, but in situation it is the finest of the three. A fourth in the valley remains one of the melancholy new ruins, which the projectors were unable to complete, and so were ruined themselves, a sudden check having been given to all such speculations when the last war broke out. It is plain that Bath has outgrown its beauty. Long suburbs extend now on every side of the city, and the meads on the opposite side of the river, which, when the Parades were built, justified the motto upon one of the houses, Rus in Urbe, are now covered with another town. It must have been in its perfection when there was nothing beyond the new bridge nor above the old Crescent.
I passed the whole morning in perambulating the town, seeing it in all its parts. The cathedral is small but beautiful; it has suffered much from the fanatics. The Pump-room is a handsome building, and hears above the entrance the words of Pindar, [Greek: Ariston men hydôr], here used in a sense concerning which there can be no dispute. I found my way into the market, which for its excellent order and abundance surpasses any thing in London, and is as surprising a sight as any in the place. There being in some places no carriage road, and in others so wide a pavement that in wet weather there would be no getting at the carriage, sedan chairs are used instead. They are very numerous, and with the chairmen, who all wear large coats of dark blue, form another distinguishing peculiarity of this remarkable town. There are two public ball-rooms, and two masters of the ceremonies, Beau Nash's empire having been divided, because it was grown too large for the superintendance of any individual: these rooms are handsome, and lighted with splendid chandeliers of cut glass, but they want that light ornamental festive character which southern taste would have given them. Some sober Englishmen in the anti-chambers were silently busied at whist, though it was noon-day,—some of them, it seems, make it the study of their lives, and others their trade. It is a fine place for gamblers, and for that species of men called fortune-hunters, a race of swindlers of the worst kind, who are happily unknown in Spain. They make it their business to get a wife of fortune, having none themselves: age, ugliness, and even idiocy, being no objections. They usually come from Ireland, and behave as ill to the women whom they have trepanned, after marriage, as the women deserve for trusting them. It is also the Canaan of Physicians; for it abounds with wealthy patients, many of whom will have any disease which the doctor will be pleased to find out for them: but even Canaan may be overstocked, and, it seems, more of Death's advanced guard have assembled here than can find milk and honey.
The enormous joints of meat which come to an English table are always roasted upon a spit as long as the old two-handed sword;[31] these spits are now turned by a wheel in the chimney which the smoke sets in motion, but formerly by the labour of a dog who was trained to run in a wheel. There was a peculiar breed for the purpose, called turnspits from their occupation, long-backed and short-legged; they are now nearly extinct. The mode of teaching them their business was more summary than humane: the dog was put in the wheel, and a burning coal with him; he could not stop without burning his legs, and so was kept upon the full gallop. These dogs were by no means fond of their profession; it was indeed hard work to run in a wheel for two or three hours, turning a piece of meat which was twice their own weight. Some years ago a party of young men at Bath hired the chairmen on a Saturday night to steal all the turnspits in town, and lock them up till the following evening. Accordingly on Sunday, when every body has roast meat for dinner, all the cooks were to be seen in the streets,—"Pray have you seen our Chloe?" says one. "Why," replies the other, "I was coming to ask you if you had seen our Pompey:" up came a third, while they were talking, to enquire for her Toby,—and there was no roast meat in Bath that day.
It is told of these dogs in this city, that one Sunday, when they had as usual followed their mistresses to church, the lesson for the day happened to be that chapter in Ezekiel, wherein the self-moving chariots are described. When first the word wheel was pronounced, all the curs pricked up their ears in alarm; at the second wheel they set up a doleful howl; and when the dreaded word was uttered a third time, every one of them scampered out of church as fast as he could, with his tail between his legs.
[30] Cavallo comadre. The meaning of the words cannot be mistaken, but the expression is not known to the translator: neither does he know that men are called horses in England as well as asses, unless, indeed, that a man with a long face is said to be like a horse.—Tr.
[31] Estoque.