166 Pre-Bailway Life in London. 



hand, on the roof of which sat men of the highest rank, 

 and invite himself to some kmcheon and champagne — which 

 he was sure to have — and — regardless of rank — to hear him 

 remark to a well-known earl, " Ches, my boy, George (a 

 prince of the blood) looks a little peaky this morning ; and 

 ' Maidstone ' does not seem up to the mark, and handsome 

 Jamie looks as if he was crossed in love." The dandies of 

 those days were far different from the class who, on the 

 return from the races, drink champagne out of tankards by 

 the roadside in some country village to the admiration of 

 suburban snobs. 



Some of them lost fortunes at hazard or on the turf, and 

 occasionally were locked up in a sponging-house for debt, 

 but many set manfully to work again, and in the colonies 

 or elsewhere made for themselves a name and position. 



The ruffianism of London was supported by a class whose 

 natural history was written by Albert Smith under the 

 name of " The G-ent," and an odious class they were. For 

 them the Haymarket taverns and night saloons and supper 

 rooms were kept open all night ; and they were the last 

 supporters of Greenwich Fair, and the orgies of Yauxhall 

 masquerades, where, under a bright morning sun, Eichard 

 Coeur de Lion and a Troubadour might have been seen 

 engaged in a drunken fight, aided and abetted by their 

 companions who, as Mary Queen of Scots and a nun 

 respectively, backed their male companions with a volley of 

 oaths which exceeded the Billingsgate of the men. 



The fact was that " complimentary " tickets for masquer- 

 ades were issued wholesale amongst the lowest of the low ; 

 as was proved by a young " lady " behind the bar of a very 

 flash drinking-shop in the Haymarket remarking to a 

 friend — " We are all going to the feet " (fete) " at Vauxhall, 

 dear, as shepherdesses ; and Mrs. B. (the landlady, a stout, 

 red-faced woman, with fingers like Cambridge sausages. 



