Club. There is no city in the world in which so much chess is played as London, and the British metropolis should certainly show, at least, one club numbering from 500 to 1,000 members. Club life is an institution peculiar to Englishmen; divans, even when so well managed as Ries's, partake rather of the Gallic element, being of the genus café. Your aristocratic Briton frequents not the public saloon, preferring the otium cum dignitate of the private club. I am aware that chess in England is not fostered by the upper ranks of society: its amateurs are to be found mainly in the middle classes. Shopmen, clerks, professors of the arts, literary men, &c., form its rank and file. The majority of these, I speak of them as Englishmen, object to a place of public resort from various reasons. Smoking displeases some, and smoking is part and parcel of a divan. The Automaton itself could not get on without its tchibouk. All the advantages and none of the drawbacks of a public hall, are to be obtained at a club; especially when, as at the St. George's, one room is set apart for smoking. Surely the late impulse given to chess by Paul Morphy's European feats, will increase the members of these chess associations, which are incontestably the best schools for progress in the game.
About the year 1824, three or four young gentlemen who had recently learned chess, or rather the mechanical part of it, and had been playing a good deal together, made vain inquiries as to the existence of a Chess Club at the West End of London, being desirous of showing off their abilities to new advantage. The foremost of these ambitious juveniles was Mr. George Walker, the eminent Chess writer, and an author, too, whose never failing bonhommie is worthy of Lafontaine. Finding that "westward the star of empire" and of chess had not, as yet, begun to "take its way," they resolved to have a Club of their own. Philidor's Club could not be said to exist; the flame was flickering in some obscure corner, and the last member was preparing to leave. But the sacred fire was not to die out: – George Walker and his fellow youngsters built an altar for it at the Percy Coffee-House in Rathbone Place, Oxford Street, and blew the flame into a perfect blaze. Percy's Coffee-House was then a first-rate hotel: Belgravia, Brompton, Pimlico, were corn-fields and market-gardens, and the aristocracy had not emigrated from the neighborhood of Oxford Street. The denizens of that ilk might be supposed to find some leisure for the enjoyment of such a pastime as chess, and Walker and Co. soon enlisted upwards of a score of recruits. Night after night the members played what they in their innocence called chess, finishing the Monday evening with a supper, after which harmony and "the flowing bowl" prevailed. Things went on swimmingly in this Mutual Admiration Society, until one of the members, Mr. Perrier, of the War Office, upset the status quo by bringing into their midst Mr. Murphy, the celebrated ivory miniature painter, and father of Mrs. Jamieson, the authoress. Dire was the result; Mr. Murphy proved a very Trojan horse in this West End Ilium: for, as Mr. Walker says, "he entirely dispelled the illusion of the 'bold Percies' that they had been playing chess." He gave them one and all a Knight, essayed the Gambit on every occasion, and not one of the young gentlemen could make a stand against him.
As though not sufficiently humiliated, Mr. Murphy introduced Mr. Lewis to them, and the new comer completed their bewilderment by giving them the Rook and sweeping them clean off the board. But with such a master, the Percies, by dint of diligent study and practice, rapidly improved, and it was suggested to Mr. Lewis that he should open a private club at his own house. After a short delay this was accomplished, and nearly all the members joined Mr. Lewis, when he opened subscription rooms in St. Martin's Lane – classic ground surely, for a former Chess Club had lived and died at Slaughter's Coffee-House, hard by.
Mr. Lewis collected quite a number of players around him, and was in fair way to find his enterprise profitable; but the most prominent members demurred to his not playing with them so much as they desired, more especially as Mr. Lewis did not appear to regard the institution as a Free School for the inculcation of Chess. The best of the young amateurs were Messrs. Walker, Brand, Mercier and McDonnell; the last, the best of the lot. McDonnell received from Mr. Lewis the odds of Pawn and Two Moves, but when he had fairly surmounted that advantage and could win every game, his antagonist declined playing on even terms, much to McDonnell's disappointment. This, however, appears to be the usual course with leading chess players, – Deschappelle's conduct in regard to Labourdonnais being a notable example of the fact. There are peculiar idiosyncrasies in chess human nature, as, for instance, the remarkable reserve and "don't-come-nigh-me" feeling with which leading amateurs treat each other. Go into any public or private chess association, and you will find that the superior craft steer clear of each other as a general thing; reserving their antagonism for matches few and far between.
The Club subsequently removed to the bottom of St. Martin's Lane, and shortly broke up, McDonnell and others returning to the London Club, whence they had migrated. A futile attempt was afterwards made to establish a grand aristocratic silk and satin club in Waterloo Place, the door of admission to which could only be opened with a golden key of ten guineas. Here lots of every thing could be found except chess, and no wonder, for the game does not find supporters, to any extent, among the rich, depending mainly upon individuals to whom ten guineas are a consideration. The club expired in twelve months. Caïssa thus lost her last foothold at the West End, and Mr. Lewis henceforth virtually abandoned the practice of chess.
The question has frequently been asked, whether and how Mr. Lewis played Labourdonnais? They played together on three different occasions, in all seven games, of which Labourdonnais won five and lost two. The first time they met was at the house of Mr. Domitt, Hon. Sec. of the London Club, and two Allgaier Gambits were played, each winning one. As they had just done their duty to a very good dinner, and society was then divided into two, three, and four bottle men, Labourdonnais remarked, "The victory is not likely to be gained by the better player, but by him who carries his wine best." This reminds me of a bon mot of Mr. Boden. Somebody remarked in his presence that two amateurs (whose names to mention "decency forbids") were both drunk, though engaged in a match game: he replied – "Then the best player will win."
After the conclusion of the two games, Messrs. Mercier, Bonfil and Domit, particular friends of the English player, challenged Labourdonnais to play Mr. Lewis a match of twenty-five games at £5 a game. This was rather too bad, considering that Labourdonnais, to use his own words, was "without a friend or a shilling in a foreign country;" but he laughed the challenge away as a joke in his own witty manner, by saying that "in such case he must be the best player who could offer to play for the highest stake," a reply which so pleased a gentleman present, Mr. Brand, that he cried out, "Labourdonnais shall play Lewis a match of 25 games at £10 a game, and I will find his stakes." It is stated that Mr. Brand evinced considerable ill-feeling towards Mr. Lewis, at the time, in consequence of the latter's preferring a move recommended by Mr. Mercier in the match then pending between the London and Edinburgh clubs, to one proposed by himself, and perhaps this was the reason for his offering to back the Frenchman against his own countryman. But Mr. Lewis's friends did not accept the challenge, and the two champions confined their contests to five off-hand games, which were played at the residences of Messrs. Bonfil and Mercier, Lewis winning one and Labourdonnais four, so that the final result was: —
The above occurrences took place on the occasion of Labourdonnais' first visit to London, many years before his famous encounters with McDonnell.
About the year 1830, a gentleman of great parts and education, named Huttmann, finding his share of this world's loaves and fishes not precisely what he could wish, opened a coffee house in Covent Garden. His patrons belonged to what society calls the "upper classes," for his prices were high and his refreshments first-rate; two considerable attractions to men of means. Amongst the frequenters of the rooms were Mr. Henry Russell, the since celebrated singer; Captain Medwin (Byron's medium), and Mr. Mackay, now Dr. Charles Mackay, the poet. Doctor Mackay was in New York during the chess tournament, and visited the rooms on that occasion, but we were then unaware of his early acquaintance with the game.
At Huttman's Coffee House, the habitués were gentlemen in quest of quietness; men of calm, reflective turn, given to chit-chat in nooks and corners; smoking a genuine "Havana" over a cup of unquestionable "Mocha," and reading that everlasting refuge for an Englishman, "The Times."
