40 Presidentship of Martin Folkes 1750 



Among the recorded visitors of the Club in the year 1750 

 the name of Sir Francis Dashwood is found under the date 

 of 2ist February. He was perhaps in his day the most 

 curious compound of drunkenness, profligacy, profanity, 

 aesthetic taste, and political ambition. He must have pos- 

 sessed no little attractiveness, however, for Oxford had 

 made him a D.C.L. in 1749, and the Royal Society had 

 elected him one of its Fellows in 1746. He was one of the 

 founders of the Dilettanti Society, for membership of which 

 at that time, according to Horace Walpole, " the nominal 

 qualification was having been to Italy and the real one being 

 drunk." He played his cards so astutely that in 1762 he 

 became for a short time Chancellor of the Exchequer under 

 Bute. He said of himself at the time " People will point 

 at me and cry, ' There goes the worst Chancellor of the 

 Exchequer that ever appeared/ ' He seems to have had 

 the reputation of being " a man to whom a sum of five 

 figures was an impenetrable secret." J But the most no- 

 torious incident in his chequered history was his institution 

 of the Hell-fire Club or " Monks of Medenham Abbey " 

 a small company which indulged in orgies of unexampled 

 and indescribable debauchery and blasphemy, an exploit 

 which he achieved about five years after he dined with 

 the Royal Philosophers, when he was no longer a youth, 

 but was not far short of fifty. 



1751. This year the Annual General Meeting was held 

 on July 25th and was attended by thirteen members. Sir 

 James Creed took the chair, and there were present also as 

 visitors the Hon. Charles Yorke, Rev. Mr. Jortain, Rev. Mr. 

 Garnett and Rev. Dr. Bradley. 



From the statement by the Treasurer it appeared that 

 the expenses during the past year had amounted to 

 4 8s. 6d., and that there remained a balance in his 

 hands of 3 I2s. 5d. 



The list of members was read, and there was only one 

 vacancy. It was resolved to postpone till next year the 

 filling up of this place. 



1 Walpole 's Memoirs of the Reign of George III., i. 172, 250. 



