" Ckoca-fokds." 79 



other the Duke of Portland, father of Lord George Bentinck— more fortunate than his grandson, 

 accumulated a fortune by his skill at cards without disgrace. 



Lord Holland in his " Memoirs of the Whig Party," says, " Mr. Pitt was, I believe, a partner 

 in the faro-bank at Goosetree's (St. James's). At that period many men of fashion did not scruple 

 to belong to such associations, and to avow it. I mention the circumstance not to the discredit 

 of Mr. Pitt, but to show by the example of so correct and decorous a man the character and 

 habits of the times."* 



Within the first quarter of this century gambling was openly carried on in tents on race- 

 courses and rooms at every race-meeting. The stage-coachmen u.sed to point out sheep marked 

 " E.O." browsing on Bagshot Heath, whose owner had won the capital for stocking a farm at 

 Ascot in an E.O. tent. A gentleman who tried to put down the hazard rooms opened during 

 Doncaster races in 1827 was not only pelted in the streets, but the subject of a vote of censure at a 

 public meeting of respectable inhabitants. 



In St. James's Street, in 1825, it might literally be said — 



" The gates of hell stood open night and day ; 

 Smooth the ascent, and easy was the way," 



to an exclusive set, privileged to ruin themselves if they chose at Crockford's ; and, if they did not, 

 to enjoy the luxuriously-furnished club, with the great chef Ude's exquisite cookery, and wines 

 purchased regardless of expense. 



It is at Crockford's, on the eve of a Derby, that the Earl of Beaconsfield,t who was one of 

 the members or constant visitors with Count d'Orsay (Mirabel), opens one of his novels with a 

 life-like dialogue ; and the same club was always one of the most popular scenes in those rubbishy 

 "fashionable novels" which Bulwer and Mrs. Gore (photographing from real lions) killed. 



But Crockford, the proprietor, like the North American Indians, who clear a country of all 

 game and then starve, consumed all the wealth of the " golden youth " (jeiincsse dorc'c) of his 



* Gambling-houses were regularly licensed, just as public-house; and music-halls are now. In 1799 the Lord Chief Justice 

 Kenyon, in one of his charges, recommended the prosecution of fashionable (unlicensed) gambling-houses, saying, " If any of 

 the guilty parties are convicted, whatever may be their rank or station, though they may be the first ladies in the land, they shall 

 certainly exhibit themselves in the pillory." The next week Gilray had a caricature of Lady Buckinghamshire and Lady Archer 

 in the pillory. About the same time another judicial charge on the same subject involved his Lordship in a correspondence with 

 H.R.H. George Prince of Wales. 



The magistrates of .Middlesex had asked Lord Kenyon to strengtiien their hands, and assist them in resisting an application 

 for a license for a new gambling-house in Bond Street, St. James's, about to be opened, under the patronage of the Prince of Wales, 

 by a Mr. Martindale, lately a bankrupt, and . defendant, as it happened, in a case tried before Lord Kenyon, at Guildhall. 

 The Chief Justice, on this person's name being mentioned, in an annuity case, said that "he remembered in a cause tried before 

 him Mr. Martindale's certificate as a bankrupt was proved of no legal efl^ect, because he had lost certain sums of money by gaming. 

 He had heard it mentioned that spacious premises were preparing in which this personage was to keep a gaming-house, under the 

 patronage of an illustrious person. That could not be done without a licence. He trusted the magistrates would do their duty to 

 the public — granting such a license would be contrary to their duty; there were gaming-houses enough already." The Prince 

 of Wales immediately addressed a letter by tlie hand of his Attoiney-General, demanding a retractation and apology, which 

 contains the following passage ; " It is true I have assented to my name being placed amongst others as a member of a new 

 club, to be under the management of a Mr. Martindale, merely for the purpose of social intercourse, of which I can never object 

 to be a promoter, especially- as it was represented to me that the object of this institution was to enable his trustees to 

 render justice to various fair claimants. . . . Give me leave to tell you that you have totally mistaken my character and 

 turn, for of all men universally known to have the least predilection to play, I am perhaps the very man in the world who stands 

 the strongest and the most proverbially so upon that point " (sic). Lord Kenyon stuck to his guns ; the king was his private 

 friend. In his reply, he said, " I have for years laboured to put an end to gaming. Man)- inferior oflTenders have been brought 

 to justice, but no eftectual prosecutions have commenced against the houses in the neighbourhood of St. James's, where examples 

 are set to the lower orders which are a great scandal to the country." — " Life of the First Lord Kenyon^' by his Grandson. 1S73. 

 t In the " Racing Calendar " of 1S72 there is a colt named " Disraeli, by Prime Minister out of Mystery." 



