The ruling passion of Fox was partly owing to the lax training of his father, who, by his lavish allowances, fostered his propensity for play. According to Chesterfield, the first Lord Holland "had no fixed principles in religion or morality," and he censures him to his son for being "too unwary in ridiculing and exposing them." He gave full swing to Charles in his youth: "let nothing be done," said his Lordship, "to break his spirit; the world will do that for him." (Selwyn.) At his death, in 1774, he left him £154,000 to pay his debts; it was all bespoke, and Fox soon became as deeply pledged as before.
Walpole, in 1781, walking up St. James's-street, saw a cart and porters at Fox's door; with copper and an old chest of drawers, loading. His success at faro had awakened a host of creditors; but, unless his bank had swelled to the size of the Bank of England, it could not have yielded a sou apiece for each. Epsom, too, had been unpropitious; and one creditor had actually seized and carried off Fox's goods, which did not seem worth removing. Yet, shortly after this, whom should Walpole find sauntering by his own door but Fox, who came up and talked to him at the coach-window, on the Marriage Bill, with as much sang froid as if he knew nothing of what had happened.
It was at the sale of Fox's library in this year that Walpole made the following singular note:—"1781, June 20. Sold by auction, the library of Charles Fox, which had been taken in execution. Amongst the books was Mr. Gibbon's first volume of 'Roman History,' which appeared, by the title-page, to have been given by the author to Mr. Fox, who had written in it the following anecdote:—'The author at Brookes's said there was no salvation for the country till six heads of the principal persons in the administration were laid on the table; eleven days later, the same gentleman accepted the place of Lord of Trade under those very ministers, and has acted with them ever since!' Such was the avidity of bidders for the smallest production of so wonderful a genius, that by the addition of this little record, the book sold for three guineas."
Lord Tankerville assured Mr. Rogers that Fox once played cards with Fitzpatrick at Brookes's from ten o'clock at night till near six o'clock the next afternoon, a waiter standing by to tell them "whose deal it was," they being too sleepy to know. Fox once won about eight thousand pounds; and one of his bond-creditors, who soon heard of his good luck, presented himself, and asked for payment. "Impossible, Sir," replied Fox; "I must first discharge my debts of honour." The bond-creditor remonstrated. "Well, Sir, give me your bond." It was delivered to Fox, who tore it in pieces, and threw them into the fire. "Now, Sir," said Fox, "my debt to you is a debt of honour;" and immediately paid him.
Amidst the wildest excesses of youth, even while the perpetual victim of his passion for play, Fox eagerly cultivated at intervals his taste for letters, especially the Greek and Roman historians and poets; and he found resources in their works, under the most severe depressions occasioned by ill-success at the gaming-table. One morning, after Fox had passed the whole night in company with Topham Beauclerc at faro, the two friends were about to separate. Fox had lost throughout the night, and was in a frame of mind approaching desperation. Beauclerc's anxiety for the consequences which might ensue led him to be early at Fox's lodgings; and on arriving, he inquired, not without apprehension, whether he had risen. The servant replied that Mr. Fox was in the drawing-room, when Beauclerc walked upstairs, and cautiously opened the door, expecting to behold a frantic gamester stretched on the floor, bewailing his losses, or plunged in moody despair; but he was astonished to find him reading a Greek Herodotus. "What would you have me do?" said Fox, "I have lost my last shilling." Upon other occasions, after staking and losing all that he could raise at faro, instead of exclaiming against fortune, or manifesting the agitation natural under such circumstances, he would lay his head on the table, and retain his place, but, exhausted by mental and bodily fatigue, almost immediately fall into a profound sleep.
One night, at Brookes's, Fox made some remark on Government powder, in allusion to something that had happened. Adams considered it a reflection, and sent Fox a challenge. Fox went out, and took his station, giving a full front. Fitzgerald said, "You must stand sideways." Fox said, "Why I am as thick one way as the other,"—"Fire," was given: Adams fired, Fox did not, and when they said he must, he said, "I'll be d—d if I do. I have no quarrel." They then advanced to shake hands. Fox said, "Adams, you'd have killed me if it had not been Government powder." The ball hit him in the groin.
Another celebrated character, who frequented Brookes's in the days of Selwyn, was Dunning, afterwards Lord Ashburton; and many keen encounters passed between them. Dunning was a short, thick man, with a turn-up nose, a constant shake of the head, and latterly a distressing hectic cough—but a wit of the first water. Though he died at the comparatively early age of fifty-two, he amassed a fortune of £150,000 during twenty-five years' practice at the bar; and lived notwithstanding, so liberally, that his mother, an attorney's widow, some of the wags at Brookes's wickedly recorded, left him in dudgeon on the score of his extravagance, as humorously sketched at a dinner at the lawyer's country-house near Fulham, when the following conversation was represented to have occurred:—
"John," said the old lady to her son, after dinner, during which she had been astounded by the profusion of the plate and viands—"John, I shall not stop another day to witness such shameful extravagance."
"But, my dear mother," interrupted Dunning, "you ought to consider that I can afford it: my income, you know—"
"No income," said the old lady impatiently, "can stand such shameful prodigality. The sum which your cook told me that very turbot cost, ought to have supported any reasonable family for a week."
"Pooh, pooh! my dear mother," replied the dutiful son, "you would not have me appear shabby. Besides, what is a turbot?"
"Pooh, pooh! what is a turbot?" echoed the irritated dame: "don't pooh me, John: I tell you such goings-on can come to no good, and you'll see the end of it before long. However, it sha'n't be said your mother encouraged such sinful waste, for I'll set off in the coach to Devonshire to-morrow morning."
"And notwithstanding," said Sheridan, "all John's rhetorical efforts to detain her, the old lady kept her word."
Sheridan's election as a member of Brookes's took place under conflicting circumstances. His success at Stafford met with fewer obstacles than he had to encounter in St. James's-street, where Selwyn's political aversions and personal jealousy were very formidable, as were those of the Earl of Bessborough, and they and other members of the Club had determined to exclude Sheridan. Conscious that every exertion would be made to ensure his success, they agreed not to absent themselves during the time allowed by the regulations of the Club for ballots; and as one black ball sufficed to extinguish the hopes of a candidate, they repeatedly prevented his election. In order to remove so serious an impediment, Sheridan had recourse to artifice. On the evening when it was resolved to put him up, he found his two inveterate enemies posted as usual. A chairman was then sent with a note, written in the name of her father-in-law, Lord Bessborough, acquainting him that a fire had broken out in his house in Cavendish Square, and entreating him immediately to return home. Unsuspicious of any trick, as his son and daughter-in-law lived under his roof, Lord Bessborough unhesitatingly quitted the room, and got into a sedan-chair. Selwyn, who resided not far from Brookes's in Cleveland-row, received, nearly at the same time, a verbal message to request his presence, in consequence of Miss Fagniani, (whom he had adopted as his daughter,) being suddenly seized with alarming indisposition. This summons he obeyed; and no sooner was the room cleared, than Sheridan being proposed a member, a ballot took place, when he was immediately chosen. Lord Bessborough and Selwyn returned without delay, on discovering the imposition that had been practised on their credulity, but they were too late to prevent its effects.
Such is the story told by Selwyn, in his Memoirs; but the following account is more generally acredited. The Prince of Wales joined Brookes's Club, to have more frequent intercourse with Mr. Fox, one of its earliest members, and who, on his first acquaintance with Sheridan, became anxious for his admission to the Club. Sheridan was three times proposed, but as often had the black
