THE DILETTANTI—THE CLUB—COSMOPOLITAN —KIT-KAT—ROYAL
SOCIETIES’—BURLINGTON FINE ARTS—ATHENÆUM—ALFRED
Of the many convivial dining clubs which once abounded in London few now
survive, though the famous and venerable Dilettanti Society happily
still flourishes. Its dinners are held at the Grafton Galleries, and
certain quaint old usages are still maintained. A member who speaks of
the Society as “the club” has to pay some petty fine, whilst the
secretary when reading the minutes puts on bands. The presence of these
somewhat ecclesiastical additions to costume in one of the beautiful
portraits belonging to this club once caused the late Mr. Gladstone to
take the picture for that of a Bishop—which aroused some merriment.
The Society was founded about 1734 by a number of gentlemen who had
travelled much in Italy, and were desirous of encouraging at home a
taste for those objects which had contributed so much to their
intellectual gratification abroad. Accordingly they formed themselves
into a Society, under the name of Dilettanti (literally, lovers of the
fine arts), and agreed upon certain regulations to keep up the spirit of
their scheme, which combined friendly and social intercourse with a
serious and ardent desire to promote the arts. In 1751 Mr. James Stuart
(“Athenian Stuart,” as he was called) and Mr. Nicholas Revett were
elected members. The Society liberally assisted them in their excellent
work, “The Antiquities of Athens.” In fact, it was in great measure
owing to the Dilettanti that, after the death of the above two eminent
architects, the work was not entirely relinquished, and a large number
of the plates were engraved from drawings in possession of the Society.
It was mainly through the influence and patronage of the Dilettanti
Society that the Royal Academy obtained its charter. In 1774 the
interest of £4,000 three per cents. was appropriated by the former for
the purpose of sending two students, recommended by the Royal Academy,
to study in Italy or Greece for three years.
In old days the funds of the Society were greatly increased by the
fines. Those paid “on increase of income, by inheritance, legacy,
marriage, or preferment,” were very odd—for instance, 5 guineas by Lord
Grosvenor, on his marriage with Miss Leveson Gower; 11 guineas by the
Duke of Bedford, on being appointed First Lord of the Admiralty; 10
guineas compounded for by Bubb Dodington, as Treasurer of the Navy; 2
guineas by the Duke of Kingston, for a colonelcy of Horse (then valued
at £400 per annum); £21 by Lord Sandwich, on going out as Ambassador to
the Congress at Aix-la-Chapelle, and 2¾d. by the same nobleman, on
becoming Recorder of Huntingdon; 13s. 4d. by the Duke of Bedford, on
getting the Garter, and 16s. 8d. (Scotch) by the Duke of Buccleuch, on
getting the Thistle; £21 by the Earl of Holderness, as Secretary of
State; and £9 19s. 6d. by Charles James Fox, as a Lord of the Admiralty.
The general toasts originally proposed and adopted by the Society were
“_Viva la Virtù_” “Grecian Taste and Roman Spirit,” and “Absent
Members.” To these was added, by a minute of March 7, 1741/2, “_Esto
præclara, esto perpetua_.” On March 29, 1789, it was resolved to add the
toast of “The King,” which was to precede all others. This addition was
no doubt due to the outburst of loyalty which took place when the King
resumed his authority, after his recovery from his first attack of
insanity, on March 10 of the same year.
Walpole was very severe upon the Dilettanti. “The nominal qualification
for membership,” said he, “is having been in Italy, and the real one,
being drunk; the two chiefs are Lord Middlesex and Sir Francis Dashwood,
who were seldom sober the whole time they were in Italy.” Were the owner
of Strawberry Hill to attend a meeting of the Society at the present
time, he would be surprised to observe the sobriety which now prevails.
In the distant past, some of the more juvenile members occasionally did
behave in a riotous manner. On January 30, 1734, for instance, a party
of young men, seven of whom (Harcourt, Middlesex, Boyne, Shirley,
Strode, Denny, and Sir James Gray) were members of the Dilettanti, met
to celebrate the birthday of one of the company present, by a dinner at
the White Eagle Tavern in Suffolk Street. The disorder caused by their
drunken revels attracted a crowd of people, who were led to believe that
the dinner was held to commemorate the execution of Charles I. on that
day, and that a calf’s head had been served at table by way of ridicule.
A bonfire was lit, and on the diners appearing at the windows they were
stoned by the mob, in spite of their protestations of fidelity to the
Government and the King. It ended in a riot, stirred up by a Catholic
priest, which the newspapers converted into an event of historical
importance.
The Dilettanti Society has never lost sight of the main objects for
which it was founded, and in 1855 a project was started for reproducing
by some process of engraving the whole of the Society’s collection of
portraits. Sir Richard Westmacott, R.A., communicated with Mr. George
Scharf, jun. (afterwards Director of the National Portrait Gallery), and
received from him an estimate of the cost of engraving on wood the
thirty-one portraits in question. The cost, however, was probably the
reason which deterred the Society from proceeding in the matter.
The Society once met at the Star and Garter Tavern in Pall Mall, but in
1800 transferred its meetings to a great room in the Thatched House
Tavern in St. James’s Street.
The ceiling here was painted to represent the sky, and was crossed by
gold cords interlacing one another, from the knots of which hung three
large glass chandeliers.
The room formed an admirable setting for the Society’s pictures, the
most remarkable of which are, of course, the three painted by Sir Joshua
Reynolds.
[Illustration:
A DINNER OF THE DILETTANTI SOCIETY AT THE THATCHED HOUSE.
From a drawing by T. H. Shepherd.
]
The first of these is a group in the manner of Paul Veronese, containing
the portraits of the Duke of Leeds, Lord Dundas, Constantine Lord
Mulgrave, Lord Seaforth, the Hon. Charles Greville, Charles Crowle,
Esq., and Sir Joseph Banks. Another group in the same style contains
portraits of Sir William Hamilton, Sir Watkin W. Wynne, Richard Thomson,
Esq., Sir John Taylor, Payne Gallwey, Esq., John Smythe, Esq., and
Spencer S. Stanhope, Esq. The portrait of Sir Joshua shows him in a
loose robe, wearing his own hair.
It should be added that earlier portraits in the possession of the
Society are by Hudson, Reynolds’s master.
Some are in eighteenth-century costume, others in Turkish or Roman
dress. There is a convivial spirit in these pictures. Lord Sandwich, for
instance, in a Turkish costume, is shown casting an affectionate glance
upon a brimming goblet in his left hand, while his right holds a flask
of great capacity. Sir Bourchier Wrey is seated in the cabin of a ship
mixing punch and eagerly embracing the bowl, of which a lurch of the sea
would seem about to deprive him; the inscription is, _Dulce est desipere
in loco_. The Dilettanti possess a curious old portrait of the Earl of
Holderness in a red cap, as a gondolier, with the Rialto and Venice in
the background; there is Charles Sackville, Duke of Dorset, as a Roman
senator, dated 1738; Lord Galloway in the dress of a Cardinal. A curious
likeness of one of the earliest of the Dilettanti—Lord le
Despencer—portrays him as a monk at his devotions, clasping a brimming
goblet for his rosary, and with eyes not very piously fixed on a statue
of the Venus de’ Medici. Some of these pictures, indeed, recall the
Medmenham orgies, with which some of the Dilettanti were not unfamiliar.
In 1884 the two groups by Sir Joshua Reynolds and the portrait of
himself were lent by the Society to the Grosvenor Gallery for an
exhibition of the collected works of the great master. In March, 1890,
on the Society’s removing from Willis’s Rooms, the two fine groups by
Sir Joshua were once more deposited on loan with the Trustees of the
National Gallery, until the whole collection of pictures was removed and
rehung in the Society’s new room in the Grafton Gallery.
During recent years the Society has from time to time added to its
pictures.
In January 1894, a portrait of Mr. William Watkiss Lloyd, painted by
Miss Bush, was received by the Society from his daughter, Miss Ellen
Watkiss Lloyd, having been bequeathed to the Society by her late father,
who had for many years been one of its most active and respected
members. After the death of Lord Leighton, President of the Royal
Academy, in January 1896, the Dilettanti, being anxious to obtain a
portrait of one of the most illustrious of their body, decided to have a
copy made of the portrait painted by Lord Leighton of himself for the
Uffizi Gallery at Florence. The work was entrusted to Mr. Charles
Holroyd (now Keeper of the National Gallery of British Art), and
completed before the close of the same year. In February 1896, on the
resignation by Mr. (now Sir) Sidney Colvin of his post as secretary and
treasurer of the Society, the Society ordered that a portrait of that
gentleman should be added to their collection. Sir Edward Poynter
undertook to paint the portrait of Mr. Colvin, which was, by permission
of the Society, sent to the Royal Academy Exhibition of 1897. Another
modern portrait of interest is Sir Edward Ryan, by Lord Leighton.
The Dilettanti, the membership of which at the present day is largely
composed of high legal and Government officials, generally have six
dinners a year, and sometimes more, at the Grafton Galleries. The
ancient ceremonies, including the appointment of a functionary known as
the Imp, are retained. The father of the club at the present day is Mr.
W. C. Cartwright, who was originally introduced by the late Lord
Houghton.
The Thatched House Tavern, in the large room of which the members of the
Dilettanti Society were once wont to assemble, was for a time also the
meeting-place of another somewhat similar society, the Literary Club.
This is now represented by The Club, which is perhaps the most exclusive
institution in Europe. So little known is the existence of this society
that at the foundation of the Turf Club it was at first proposed to call
it The Club; and, indeed, it was some time before the discovery that the
name had been long before appropriated placed the adoption of such an
appellation out of the question. The membership of The Club is limited
in the extreme, which may be realized when it is stated that since its
foundation, in 1764, not 300 members have secured election. Forty,
according to the regulations, is the extreme limit of membership.
Amongst distinguished men who have been members appear the names of Dr.
Johnson, Boswell, Garrick, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Oliver Goldsmith, Burke,
Fox, and Gibbon. In more modern times many prominent personalities have
been members—amongst them Mr. Gladstone, Lord Leighton, Professor
Huxley, Lord Salisbury, Lord Rosebery, Lord Goschen, the Duke of Argyll,
Lord Herschell, Lord Dufferin, Lord Wolseley, Sir Mountstuart Grant
Duff, Mr. Arthur Balfour, Lord Peel, Mr. Asquith, Sir Edward Poynter,
and many others whose names are well known in legal, political,
artistic, and literary circles.
The club was founded in 1764 by Sir Joshua Reynolds and Dr. Samuel
Johnson, and for some years met on Monday evenings at seven. In 1772 the
day of meeting was changed to Friday, and about that time, instead of
supping, they agreed to dine together once in every fortnight during the
sitting of Parliament. In 1773 The Club, which soon after its foundation
consisted of twelve members, was enlarged to twenty; March 11, 1777, to
twenty-six; November 27, 1778, to thirty; May 9, 1780, to thirty-five;
and it was then resolved that it should never exceed forty. It met
originally at the Turk’s Head, in Gerrard Street, and continued to meet
there till 1783, when their landlord died, and the house was soon
afterwards shut up. They then removed to Prince’s, in Saville Street;
and on his house being, soon afterwards, shut up, they removed to
Baxter’s, which afterwards became Thomas’s, in Dover Street. In January
1792, they removed to Parsloe’s, in St. James’s Street; and on February
26, 1799, to the Thatched House, in the same street.
The club received the name of Literary Club at Garrick’s funeral.
In the early days of The Club, Dr. Johnson was exceedingly particular as
to the admission of candidates, and would not hear of any increase in
the number of members. Not long after its institution, Sir Joshua
Reynolds was speaking of the club to Garrick. “I like it much,” said the
great actor briskly; “I think I shall be of you.” When Sir Joshua
mentioned this to Dr. Johnson, the latter, according to Boswell, was
much displeased with the actor’s conceit. “He’ll be of us!” growled he;
“how does he know we will permit him?”
Sir John Hawkins tried to soften Johnson, and spoke to him of Garrick in
a very eulogistic way. “Sir,” replied Johnson, “he will disturb us by
his buffoonery.” In the same spirit he declared to Mr. Thrale that, if
Garrick should apply for admission, he would blackball him. “Who, sir?”
exclaimed Thrale, with surprise: “Mr. Garrick—your friend, your
companion—blackball him?” “Why, sir,” replied Johnson, “I love my little
David dearly—better than all or any of his flatterers do; but surely one
ought to sit, in a society like ours,
‘Unelbowed by a gamester, pimp, or player.’”
By degrees the rigour of the club relaxed; some of the members grew
negligent. Beauclerk lost his right of membership by neglecting to
attend. Nevertheless, on his marriage (with Lady Diana Spencer, daughter
of the Duke of Marlborough, and recently divorced from Viscount
Bolingbroke), he claimed and regained his seat in the club. The number
of the members was likewise augmented. The proposition to increase it
originated with Goldsmith. “It would give,” he thought, “an agreeable
variety to their meetings; for there can be nothing new amongst us,”
said he: “we have travelled over each other’s minds.” Johnson was piqued
at the suggestion. “Sir,” said he, “you have not travelled over my mind,
I promise you.” Sir Joshua, less confident in the exhaustless fecundity
of his mind, felt and acknowledged the force of Goldsmith’s suggestion.
Several new members therefore were elected; the first, to his great joy,
was David Garrick. Goldsmith, who was now on cordial terms with the
great actor, zealously promoted his election, and Johnson gave it his
warm approbation.
The meetings of the Literary Club were often the occasion of much
discussion between Edmund Burke and Johnson. One evening the former
observed that a hogshead of claret, which had been sent as a present to
the club, was almost out, and proposed that Johnson should write for
another in such ambiguity of expression as might have a chance of
procuring it also as a gift. One of the company said: “Dr. Johnson shall
be our dictator.” “Were I,” said Johnson, “your dictator, you should
have no wine; it would be my business ‘cavere ne quid detrimenti
respublica caperet.’ Wine is dangerous; Rome was ruined by luxury.”
Burke replied: “If you allow no wine as dictator, you shall not have me
for master of the horse.”
Dr. Johnson for a time completely dominated the club, and once, in his
usual grandiloquent manner, said to Boswell: “Sir, you got into the club
by doing what a man can do. Several of the members wished to keep you
out; Burke told me he doubted if you were fit for it. Now you are in,
none of them are sorry.” _Boswell_: “They were afraid of you, sir, as it
was you proposed me.” _Johnson_: “Sir, they knew that if they refused
you they would probably have never got into another club—I would have
kept them all out.”
At last, owing to his ill-temper and rudeness, the great lexicographer’s
influence in the club sensibly decreased.
The club possesses a very valuable collection of autographs of former
distinguished members, and amongst its memorials is a portrait of Sir
Joshua Reynolds, with spectacles on, similar to the picture in the Royal
Collection; this portrait was painted and presented by Sir Joshua, as
the founder of the club.
Another club which was once the resort of many clever and distinguished
men was the Cosmopolitan, in Charles Street, Berkeley Square. This
ceased to exist not very many years ago. The house in which it held its
meetings had been pulled down, and though the Cosmopolitan migrated to
the Alpine Club, it did not long survive the change. Its meetings were
held twice a week, in the evening, no meals whatever being served,
though light refreshments were supplied. The house in Charles Street had
previously contained the studio of Watts the painter, and a great
feature of the club-room was a very large picture representing a scene
from the “Decameron,” which had been painted by that artist. This is now
in the Tate Gallery. When the Cosmopolitan was dissolved, a certain sum
of money remained, and this, on the suggestion of a former leading
member, is gradually being spent in dinners at which former members from
time to time foregather.
A dining club which for a time attracted considerable attention was the
Roxburghe, which originated under the following circumstances: The Duke
of Roxburghe was a noted bibliophile; the sale of his library, which
excited great interest in 1812, lasted for forty-two days, and on the
evening when the sale had been concluded the club was formed by about
sixteen bibliomaniacs, after a dinner at the St. Albans Tavern, Lord
Spencer being in the chair. The Roxburghe consisted mostly of men
devoted to rare books. Tomes containing alterations in the title-page,
or in a leaf, or in any trivial circumstance, were bought by these
collectors at £100, £200, or £300, though the copies were often of small
intrinsic worth. Specimens of first editions of all authors, and
editions by the early printers, were never sold for less than £50, £100,
or £200. So great became this mania that, in order to gratify the
members of the club, facsimile copies of clumsy editions of trumpery
books were reprinted. In some cases, indeed, it became worth the while
of unscrupulous people to palm off forgeries upon the more credulous of
these collectors.
The club issued various publications, but its costly dinners attracted
more attention than anything else. On one occasion the bill was above £5
10s. per head, and the list of toasts included the “immortal memory” not
only of John, Duke of Roxburghe, but of William Caxton, Dame Juliana
Berners, Wynkyn de Worde, Richard Pynson, the Aldine family, and “The
Cause of Bibliomania all over the World.” In one year, when Lord Spencer
presided over the club feast, the “Roxburghe Revels” thus recorded the
fact: “Twenty-one members met joyfully, dined comfortably, challenged
eagerly, tippled prettily, divided regretfully, and paid the bill most
cheerfully.”
The bill of one of the dinners of the Roxburghe Club held at Grillion’s
Hotel has been preserved. Its curious phraseology is due to the French
waiter who made it out:
DINNER (_sic_) DU 17 JUIN, 1815.
£ s. d.
20 20 0 0
Desser 2 0 0
Deu sorte de Glasse 1 4 0
Glasse pour 6 0 4 0
5 Boutelle de Champagne 4 0 0
7 Boutelle de harmetage 5 5 0
1 Boutelle de Hok 0 15 0
4 Boutelle de Port 1 6 0
4 Boutelle de Maderre 2 0 0
22 Boutelle de Bordeaux 15 8 0
2 Boutelle de Bourgogne 1 12 0
[Not legible] 0 14 0
Soder 0 2 0
Biere e Ail 0 6 0
For la Lettre 0 2 0
Pour faire une prune 0 6 0
Pour un fiacre 0 2 0
— — —
55 6 0
Waiters 1 14 0
— — —
£57 0 0
Amongst the curious old clubs of the eighteenth century, the Kit-Kat,
founded about 1700, deserves attention. This was composed of thirty-nine
noblemen and gentlemen zealously attached to the House of Hanover, among
them six Dukes and many other peers. The club met at a small house in
Shire Lane, by Temple Bar, where a famous mutton-pie man, by name
Christopher Katt, supplied his pies to the club suppers and gave his
name to the club, although it has been stated that the pie itself was
called “kit-kat.”
The extraordinary title of the club is explained in the following lines:
“Whence deathless Kit-Kat took its name,
Few critics can unriddle;
Some say from pastrycook it came.
And some from Cat and Fiddle.
“From no trim beaux its name it boasts,
Grey statesmen or green wits.
But from the pell-mell peck of toasts
Of old cats and young kits.”
A feature of the club was its toasts. Every member was compelled to name
a beauty, whose claims to the honour were then discussed; and if her
name was approved, a special tumbler was consecrated to her, and verses
to her honour engraved on it. Such of these tumblers as still survive
must be very rare. When only eight years old, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
enjoyed the honour of having her charms commemorated on one of these
“toasting tumblers.” Her father, afterwards Duke of Kingston, in a fit
of caprice proposed “The Pretty Little Child” as his toast. The other
members, who had never seen her, objected, but, the child having been
sent for, found her charming, and yielded. The forward little girl was
handed from knee to knee, petted and caressed by the assembled wits.
Another celebrated toast of the Kit-Kat, mentioned by Walpole, was Lady
Molyneux, who, he says, died smoking a pipe.
Several of the more celebrated of these “toasts” had their portraits
hung in the club-room.
The character of the club was political as well as literary, but its
chief aim was the promotion of culture and wit. The members subscribed
the sum of 400 guineas to offer as prizes for the best comedies written.
This club at one period of its existence had a room built for the
members at Barn Elms (now the highly prosperous Ranelagh Club). This was
hung with portraits painted by Kneller, which, being all of one size,
originated the name “Kit-Kat,” which is still in use.
A prominent member of the Kit-Kat Club was the famous Court physician,
Dr. Samuel Garth, who, while dining one evening, protested that he must
leave early, as he had many patients to visit. Nevertheless he lingered
on hour after hour. Sir Richard Steele, who was present, reminded him of
his professional duties, when Garth produced a list of fifteen patients.
“It matters little,” he cried, “whether I see them or not to-night. Nine
or ten are so bad that all the doctors in the world could not save them,
and the remainder have such tough constitutions that they want no
doctors.”
A celebrated early eighteenth-century literary club was the Royal
Society, instituted by a number of literary men who met in Dean’s Court,
there to dine on fish and drink porter. One of these gatherings expanded
into the Club of Royal Philosophers, or, as it came to be called, the
Royal Society Club. They dined together on Thursdays, usually to the
number of six, but sometimes more. A favourite dining-place was
Pontack’s, the celebrated French eating-house in Abchurch Lane, City;
and they also dined at the Devil Tavern, near Temple Bar, and at the
Mitre Tavern, in Fleet Street. In 1780 the club, as it had become, went
to the Crown and Anchor Tavern, in the Strand; and here they remained
for sixty-eight years, only removing to the Freemasons’ Tavern, in Fleet
Street, in 1848. Finally, when the Royal Society was installed at
Burlington House in 1857, the club held its meetings at the Thatched
House, in St. James’s Street, which they frequented until that tavern
was demolished.
As time went on, the cost of the club dinner gradually rose. It began at
1s. 6d. per head, then went to 4s., including wine and 2d. to the
waiter, and was afterwards increased to 10s. The wine was laid in at £45
the pipe, or 1s. 6d. per bottle, and charged by the landlord at 2s. 6d.
This club was sometimes known as Dr. Halley’s, for Halley was said to
have been its founder.
An eccentric member was the Hon. Henry Cavendish, commonly called the
“Club Crœsus.” Though wealthy, he seldom had enough money in his pockets
to pay for his dinner, and his manners were extraordinary. He picked his
teeth with a fork, carried his cane stuck in his right boot, and was
very angry when anyone else hung his hat on the peg he preferred in the
hall. Yet he was not unsociable; he is said to have left a large legacy
to a fellow-member—Lord Bessborough—in gratitude for his pleasant
conversation.
Cavendish was rather a misogynist. One evening a pretty girl chanced to
be at an upper window on the opposite side of the street, watching the
philosophers at dinner. She attracted notice, and one by one they got up
and mustered round the window to admire the fair one. Cavendish, who
thought they were looking at the moon, bustled up to them in his odd
way, and, when he saw the real object of their study, turned away with
intense disgust, and grunted out “Pshaw!”
The President of the Royal Society was always elected president of the
club. Princes, Ministers, men of high rank, and Ambassadors were
entertained together with men of science, great ecclesiastics, and
distinguished soldiers and sailors; Franklin, Jenner, John Hunter, Sir
Joshua Reynolds, Sir Thomas Lawrence, Gibbon, Wedgwood, Turner, De la
Beche, and Brunel were amongst these.
The modern Royal Societies Club, in St. James’s Street, has no
connection with the ancient institution just mentioned. It was founded
in 1894, and its members either belong to learned societies,
Universities, and institutions of the United Kingdom, or are well known
in the spheres of Literature, Science, and Art. The committee possesses
the right of granting the use of certain rooms in the club-house for
lectures or for meetings of any of the societies or institutions
recognized by the constitution of the club. This club has a somewhat
peculiar subscription, town members—that is, those residing within a
radius of twenty miles—paying eight guineas, country members six, and
colonial and foreign members two.
A club which has done much to promote a knowledge and appreciation of
art in London is the Burlington Fine Arts, now at 17 Savile Row. This
was founded in 1866, when the Marquis d’Azeglio, then Sardinian Minister
in London, and a well known connoisseur, was chairman. In the early days
there were 250 members, and the club premises were at No. 177
Piccadilly. At that time the Fine Arts Club was still in existence, and
most of its members joined what was called the Burlington Fine Arts
Club, on account of its premises being opposite Burlington House, into
which the Royal Academy had just moved. Exhibitions of considerable
importance were held in the rooms in Piccadilly, the first chiefly of
French etchings, and the last (in 1870) of original drawings by Raphael
and Michael Angelo. In that year the club moved to Savile Row, where was
built the present gallery, which has been the scene of a series of
annual exhibitions.
The membership of this flourishing association of art-lovers is now 500,
and since the foundation of the club its annual exhibitions have
gathered together many priceless works of art in the club-house. This,
however, contains no furniture or _objets d’art_ calling for mention,
with the exception of an Italian sixteenth-century mirror boldly carved
out of walnut wood in the style of Michael Angelo. The present chairman
is Lord Brownlow, whilst the secretarial duties are most ably performed
by Mr. Beavan.
The foremost modern literary club in England is of course the Athenæum,
which was first established in 1824, under the name of The Society. The
latter appellation was, however, changed to the Athenæum at an inaugural
dinner given at No. 12 Waterloo Place.
Three years later the committee, having obtained possession of a more
convenient site, part of which had been occupied by the recently
demolished Carlton House, entrusted Decimus Burton with the task of
building a suitable club-house. In the course of its construction Croker
insisted that the Scotch sculptor, John Heming, should contribute a
frieze designed as a reproduction of that of the Parthenon—an
ornamentation at the time characterized as an extravagant novelty. In
spite of a good deal of opposition, Croker carried the day, and the
construction of an ice-house, which had been advocated by several
members, was abandoned in order to afford funds for the classical
decoration.
In connection with this was written the epigram:
“I’m John Wilson Croker,
I do as I please:
They ask for an Ice-house,
I’ll give ’em—a Frieze.”
The new Athenæum club-house was formally opened in February 1830, some
soirées being given, to which ladies were admitted, though not without
protest. The building, which is of some architectural interest, was
erected on the west end of the courtyard of old Carlton House, the
smoking-room being exactly under what was the Prince Regent’s
dining-room.
In the finely-proportioned hall eight pale primrose pillars on broad
bronzed bases, copied from the Temple of the Winds at Athens, support
the panelled waggon roof, the Pompeian ornamentation being of an
original design. The two statues in niches, “Venus Victrix” and “Diana
Robing,” were chosen by Sir Thomas Lawrence, who also designed the club
seal.
On the right of the hall is the morning-room, redecorated in 1892, when
the ceiling was elaborately painted by Sir Edward Poynter. The bust of
Milton in this room was bequeathed by Anthony Trollope; in the adjoining
writing-room hangs a portrait of Dr. Johnson by Opie, the gift of Mr.
Humphry Ward. The drawing-room upstairs, one of the finest rooms in
London, has no fewer than eleven windows. But the chief glory of the
Athenæum is its library, the view from which embraces the pretty garden,
where a rookery once existed. The annual expenditure on books since 1848
has averaged about £450. The Athenæum library is by far the finest and
most important club library in the world, all departments of foreign as
well as English books being represented by rare and complete examples.
Moreover, there is on its shelves one of the best collections of
reference books in England, and the bookcases are stored with valuable
volumes—rare tomes dealing with history, topography, and archæology, as
well as sumptuously-bound books on art. Of these a number were obtained
under a legacy of the Rev. Charles Turner, and others were left by the
late Mr. Felix Slade. The collection of English pamphlets is also
singularly complete, and includes 21 volumes collected together by Sir
James Mackintosh, 43 by Dr. Nasmith the antiquary, 139 volumes by Morton
Pitt, 23 volumes by Gibbon on historical and financial subjects, 23
volumes devoted to foreign and colonial affairs, and 52 volumes of
smaller publications relating to America. Amongst literary matter of a
lighter description preserved in this library are 26 portfolios
containing newspapers and caricatures collected during the siege of
Paris and the Commune. In a case is preserved a large number of proof
engravings, most of them after portraits of members. These were executed
by George Richmond, R.A., who presented the collection. An interesting
relic of Thackeray is the original manuscript of “The Orphan of
Pimlico,” in the great novelist’s beautiful handwriting.
A portrait of George IV was formerly over the fireplace. Sir Thomas
Lawrence, its painter, was engaged in finishing the sword-knot and
orders only a few hours before his death. He intended to present it to
the club, but, as his executors declined to part with it, the painting
was eventually purchased for £128 10s. This portrait is now in the
museum of the Royal Pavilion at Brighton, having been handed over to the
Corporation of that town in 1858. Busts of Dr. Johnson (presented by Mr.
Percy Fitzgerald) and of Pope (a bequest) are here, together with the
carved armchair used by Dickens at Gad’s Hill, in which, on the day of
his death, the great novelist had been sitting at work on “Edwin Drood.”
Many will remember “The Empty Chair” which appeared in the then
newly-founded _Graphic_ in June 1870. Macaulay’s corner, near the books
on English history, is a well-known feature of this library, which the
late Mark Pattison said he thought the most delightful place in the
world, especially on a Sunday morning. At the table in the south-west
corner Thackeray used constantly to work. A great habitué of the library
in the early days of the club was Isaac Disraeli, who, as befitted the
author of the “Curiosities of Literature,” was one of the earliest
members—indeed, one of the founders of the club. His invariable costume
consisted of a blue coat with brass buttons, a yellow waistcoat, and
knee-breeches. A similar fashion was followed by another member—Dr.
Booth—as late as 1863.
One evening, in or about the year 1830, a non-member, young Benjamin
Disraeli, in defiance of the club rules, coolly walked upstairs to the
library, and there proceeded to confer with his father. He was duly
requested to withdraw, and it is perhaps not extraordinary that the
future Prime Minister should have been blackballed in 1832. The reason
given at the time for this rejection was that his proposer or seconder
had rendered himself particularly unpopular.
It was not until thirty-four years later that the great statesman became
a member of the Athenæum, to which he was admitted under the rule
allowing the committee to elect annually a limited number of persons
“who have attained to distinguished eminence.” As Lord Beaconsfield he
seems to have used the club but little, although, according to
tradition, he abstracted from the library his own “Revolutionary Epick,”
written in 1834.
In a corner of the Athenæum library the late Cardinal Manning, who had
been elected at a time when he was attending the Vatican Council, used
to sit quietly reading. At one time he used the club a good deal, as did
another venerable ecclesiastic, Dr. Tatham, noted for eccentricity and
long sermons. Yet another divine well known at the Athenæum was the
nonagenarian Bishop Durnford, of Chichester. Bishops have always been
more or less abundant at this club, for which reason, when an unusually
large number were collected together for Convocation, Abraham Hayward is
said to have grumbled out: “I see the Bishops are beginning to swarm:
the atmosphere is alive with them; every moment I expect to find one
dropping into my soup.”
There was a great storm amongst the Bishops when Bishop Colenso visited
England, and, as can be imagined, his admission to the Athenæum as an
honorary member was violently opposed.
Samuel Wilberforce, Lord Lytton the novelist, Abraham Hayward (the
Vernon Tuft of Samuel Warren’s “Ten Thousand a Year,” still remembered
by some), and many other celebrated characters, were frequenters of this
peaceful room. Here, too, Theodore Hook dashed off much brilliant work.
This spontaneous and volatile wit at one time used the club a great
deal. He it was who wrote the lines:
“There’s first the Athenæum Club, so wise, there’s not a man of it
That has not sense enough for six (in fact, that is the plan of it);
The very waiters answer you with eloquence Socratical,
And always place the knives and forks in order mathematical.”
Hook dined much at the Athenæum—often, it was said, “not wisely, but too
well.” The name of his favourite spot in the dining-room—“Temperance
Corner”—is still preserved. Here he used to call for toast-and-water and
lemonade, which the waiters quite understood was his humorous way of
indicating the various alcoholic beverages of which he was so fond. Hook
loved to sit long over his meals, in which respect it is interesting to
remember he was quite unlike Dickens, who often lunched standing, off
sandwiches.
It was at the foot of the Athenæum staircase that the author of
“Pickwick” ended his unfortunate estrangement from Thackeray, being
intercepted by the latter and forced to shake hands.
Intellect rather than love of comfort formerly distinguished most
members of the club, and for this reason, perhaps, the Athenæum has
never been noted for its cooking. “Asiatic Sundays” was the name given
to the Sabbaths, on which curry and rice always appeared on the bill of
fare. Another Athenæum dinner was known for its marrow-bones and jam
roly-poly puddings. Sir Edwin Landseer once denounced an Athenæum
beefsteak in a terse manner: “They say there’s nothing like leather;
this beefsteak is.” A boar’s head on the sideboard was described by a
witty member as the head of a certain member who had at last met with
the thoroughly deserved fate of decapitation.
Kinglake, the historian, lived almost entirely at the Athenæum, even
when aged, infirm, and terribly deaf. People used to say that, when they
talked to him, everybody in the room heard except Kinglake. Like many
deaf men, he was given to shouting in people’s ears, and on one occasion
was heard screaming to Thackeray at the top of his voice: “Come and sit
down; I have something very private to tell you: no one must hear it but
you.” Another distinguished soldier, equally deaf, used to select the
smoking-room of his club for confidential conversations with members of
his staff, putting momentous questions and receiving answers which were
given in such a loud tone that everyone heard his official secrets.
The Athenæum has never been very favourable to the stage. Some of the
great actors of the past, however, belonged to it, notably Sir Henry
Irving, who was a most popular member.
Other actor members were Charles Mathews the elder, Macready, Charles
Mayne Young, Charles Kemble, Charles Kean, and Daniel Terry.
Considering the partiality of literary men for tobacco, it seems curious
that the only smoking-room in this club used to be in the basement. To
supply a pressing need, an upper floor was a short time ago constructed
at the top of the building; and smokers can now be conveyed by a lift,
put in at the time of the alterations in 1900.
Membership of the Athenæum would seem to favour a man’s chances of
living to a green old age, and certain members have belonged to the club
for an extraordinary number of years. Mr. Lettsom Elliot, for instance,
who died in 1898, had been a member since 1824, when he was elected at
the first committee meeting of the club. Mr. Elliot had kept a copy of
the first list of members, and in 1882 he had a reprint of this
produced, which forms a record of considerable interest. On this
committee were Chantrey, the sculptor; John Wilson Croker; Sir Humphry
Davy; Sir Thomas Lawrence; Sir James Mackintosh; Tom Moore, the poet;
Sir Walter Scott; together with some others. Amongst distinguished
ordinary members have been Benjamin Brodie; Mark Isambard Brunel, the
engineer; Dibdin; Isaac Disraeli; Lord Ellenborough; Michael Faraday;
John Franklin; Henry Hallam; James Morier, the diplomatist, and author
of “Haji Baba”; Samuel Rogers; Sir John Soane, who bequeathed to the
nation the Soane Museum in Lincoln’s Inn Fields; Joseph Turner; Charles
Kemble; Charles Mathews the elder; Westall, the artist; David Wilkie;
Henry Holland; Blanco White, a friend of Coleridge’s; Whately; Newman;
Jekyll, the wit; John Stuart Mill; and Herbert Spencer.
The last-named was fond of playing billiards in the club, where he is
said to have made the famous remark to a very skilful antagonist:
“Though a certain proficiency at this game is to be desired, the skill
you have shown seems to argue a misspent youth.”
A club which somewhat resembled the present Athenæum in character was
the Alfred, founded in 1808 for men of letters, travellers, and the
like. It was first started at a house in Albemarle Street, when it
appears to have been a very solemn institution. A member, indeed, not in
sympathy with its tone, called it the “dullest place in the world, where
bores prevailed to the exclusion of every other interest, and one heard
nothing but idle reports and twaddling opinions. It is,” said he, “the
asylum of doting Tories and drivelling quidnuncs.”
Lord Byron, however, called it “a pleasant club—a little too sober and
literary, perhaps, but, on the whole, a decent resource on a rainy day.”
In 1811, three years after its foundation, there were no fewer than 354
candidates for six vacancies, but this happy state of affairs did not
last.
Sir William Fraser described the Alfred as having been “a sort of minor
Athenæum,” which perhaps caused a wag to say the title should be changed
from Alfred to “Halfread.”
Lord Alvanley, who was a member, once said at White’s: “I stood the
Alfred as long as I could, but when the seventeenth Bishop was proposed
I gave in; I really could not enter the place without being put in mind
of my Catechism.” The Bishops, it is said, resigned the club when a
billiard-table was introduced. In the course of time the Alfred
languished, and was finally dissolved in 1855.
Hatred of tobacco, it is said, caused the end of the Alfred. A certain
influential section of members persistently opposing any improvement in
the smoking-room, which was at the top of the house and stigmatized as
an “infamous hole,” the committee would make no concession, and so the
club was eventually closed.
When it was evident that the Alfred could not maintain an independent
existence (though perfectly solvent), a sort of coalition was formed
with the Oriental. A large number of members were admitted to the latter
without entrance fee, but most of the Alfred members joined other clubs,
especially the Athenæum.
A flourishing little literary club of modern origin is the Savile, in
Piccadilly. This possesses a very curious table, which was purchased
some years ago. It would appear to have been made during the
mid-Victorian period, and is embellished with a number of curious
designs in various woods—masterpieces of the inlayer’s art. Amongst
these is a portrait of the late Queen Victoria.
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