e 16: Charles Montagu, Earl of Halifax. Lord Halifax was born in
1661, and died in 1715. He was called 'Mouse Montagu.']

[Footnote 17: See Burke's 'Peerage.']

[Footnote 18: The Duchess of Marlborough received L10,000 by Mr.
Congreve's will.]

BEAU NASH.

The King of Bath.--Nash at Oxford.--'My Boy Dick.'--Offers of
Knighthood.--Doing Penance at York.--Days of Folly.--A very
Romantic Story.--Sickness and Civilization.--Nash descends upon
Bath.--Nash's Chef-d'oeuvre.--The Ball.--Improvements in the
Pump-room, &c.--A Public Benefactor.--Life at Bath in Nash's
time.--A Compact with the Duke of Beaufort.--Gaming at
Bath.--Anecdotes of Nash.--'Miss Sylvia.'--A Generous
Act.--Nash's Sun setting.--A Panegyric.--Nash's Funeral.--His
Characteristics.

There is nothing new under the sun, said Walpole, by way of a very
original remark. 'No,' whispered George Selwyn, 'nor under the grandson,
either.'

Mankind, as a body, has proved its silliness in a thousand ways, but in
none, perhaps, so ludicrously as in its respect for a man's coat. He is
not always a fool that knows the value of dress; and some of the wisest
and greatest of men have been dandies of the first water. King Solomon
was one, and Alexander the Great was another; but there never was a more
despotic monarch, nor one more humbly obeyed by his subjects, than the
King of Bath, and he won his dominions by the cut of his coat. But as
Hercules was killed by a dress-shirt, so the beaux of the modern world
have generally ruined themselves by their wardrobes, and brought remorse
to their hearts, or contempt from the very people who once worshipped
them. The husband of Mrs. Damer, who appeared in a new suit twice a-day,
and whose wardrobe sold for L15,000, blew his brains out at a
coffee-house. Beau Fielding, Beau Nash, and Beau Brummell all expiated
their contemptible vanity in obscure old age of want and misery. As the
world is full of folly, the history of a fool is as good a mirror to
hold up to it as another; but in the case of Beau Nash the only question
is, whether he or his subjects were the greater fools. So now for a
picture of as much folly as could well be crammed into that hot basin in
the Somersetshire hills, of which more anon.

It is a hard thing for a man not to have had a father--harder still,
like poor Savage, to have one whom he cannot get hold of; but perhaps it
is hardest of all, when