1830.] The Club- Room. 39 



though I disbelieve the report, may bring him in upwards of fifty 

 pounds. 



Flourish. Absurd ! He no more wrote it than you. It was, like 

 himself, the offspring of the Countess ; and a delightful, clever creature 

 she is. I remember her in my Irish boyhood, the most brilliant and fear- 

 less dasher of her circle, handsome as an Houri, gay as a lark, light as 

 gossamer, and fantastic as a French Marquise. I have seen her in the 

 course of a day drive a curricle and four for one wager, and horsewhip a 

 posse of aids-de-camp for another ; put a mob to flight, and throw a 

 review into disorder ; out-look, out-talk, out-smile, and out-shine every 

 belle at the Castle in the. evening; break down the master of the ceremonies 

 in a waltz ; extinguish the official wit of the Secretary at supper ; send 

 the Chancellor home with every lamp double in his eyes ; and finish 

 the night by playing queen at a masquerade till eight in the morn- 

 ing. Heigh, ho ! (A general laugh. Mummy, who had fallen asleep, 

 starts up.) 



Mummy. Eh ! What's the matter. The Ministry changed ! In 

 troubled times every man must look to himself; and it is my deter- 

 mination, at all hazards, to serve my country. ( General amazement.) 



The Chairman. Well said, Mummy. Gentlemen, spare yourselves 

 the trouble of being astonished. The maxim is a true working one, 

 though it may not always have the advantage of being so distinctly 

 expressed. 



Mummy. But the bottle stands. I propose, fc May his Highness live 

 a thousand years." (All rise, and drink the toast with three times three.) 

 But what was the source of the disturbance ? 



The Chairman. The double discovery that Glengall did not write his 

 comedy, and that Flourish is furiously in love both of equal import- 

 ance ; and which may be equally left to the decision of posterity within 

 the next half dozen days. As to Glengall, I must not have him laughed 

 at : he employs himself better even in copying Alvanley's puns, than if 

 he were playing Treasury tricks ; and Ringlet himself will acknowledge 

 that Covent Garden is as secure a place for a man's purse as Crockford's. 

 Culverin. Not when the new actress plays. I am told that half a 

 hundred of our young heirs are ready to fling themselves at her feet 

 already. That St. James's is only a sort of preserve for her; and that 

 she may bag guardsmen, diplomatists, from fifteen to five and twenty, 

 and lords by courtesy, like pheasants, for the mere trouble of a shot at 

 them. She is certainly clever ; and for the good of the falling or fallen 

 stage, will, it is to be hoped, be contented to be a Tragedy Queen, with- 

 out being in a hurry to be a tenth-rate Countess. She has figure, voice, 

 and features for the theatre. All imperfect still. But she has dramatic 

 thought, palpable poetry of conception ; and a strong sensibility to the 

 grace, force, and majesty of the stage. 



Lancer. Apropos; what is become of the other lordly aspirants 

 for the bays? The flight of callous nobles, who a season or two ago 

 fluttered their illustrious winglets with such a general cawing and 

 screaming? I felt an instinctive fear that the desperate list of " royal 

 and noble authors" was about to be recruited ; the world to be overrun 

 with the " Delia Crusca," revived ; tragedy dressed in the frippery of 

 the drawing-room ; comedy sicklied into the jargon of Almack's ; and 

 farce crammed with the manners of Newmarket, the stratagems of Tat- 

 tersall's, and the morality of Crockford's, until the land cast them out, 



