costume of one of those pastoral beauties immortalised in Chelsea china; and attired in a stiff dress of primrose brocade and gipsy hat, with pale blue ribbons, sat by the side of a pond, in the grounds, with a fishing-rod in her hand, the best part of a broiling summer's day, nervously expecting her Colin-it is needless to add, in vain.

Under the influence of these examples, Master George Brummell doubtless cultivated his natural penchant for fun; but in the early part of the year 1793, the sounds of festivity were hushed at the Grove; death left Mr. Brummell a widower; and exactly one year and a day after his wife's burial, he was himself carried to the family vault at St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, and laid beside her. This event took place the 17th of March, 1794. Mr. Brummell died, leaving two sons, and a daughter; William, the eldest, married in May, 1800, Miss Daniel (whose sister was married to a brother of Lord Gwydyr), and the daughter became the wife of a Captain Blackshaw, who resided in a cottage near the Grove.

Mr. Brummell's youngest son, George Bryan Brummell, the subject of the present memoir, had not quite completed his sixteenth year at the time of his father's death, having been born on the 7th of June, 1778, and baptized on the 2nd of July, at St. Margaret's, Westminster. I am ignorant who on this occasion promised to answer for his anticipated misdeeds, but his second Christian name would seem to imply, that the shade of the old Irish hero came back from the world of

spirits to do him honour.

A very handsome provision was left, at Mr. Brummell's death, for his three children, proving that he not only knew how to acquire money, but how to keep it; a virtue which in this, as in the generality of cases with fortunes rapidly made, did not descend,—at least to his youngest son. The sum of £65,000, which Mr. Brummell died possessed of, was placed in the hands of trustees, to be equally divided amongst his children, on their attaining their majority. The amount is so large, more particularly when it is remembered that Mr. Brummell was given to acts of hospitality, that it leads to the supposition that he speculated successfully; probably like his patron, Lord North, in the funds.

Such was the origin of the Beau's family, and such the details I have been able to collect respecting it. He seldom touched upon the subject of his genealogical tree-never in conversation; but, in one of his notes to a lady hereafter given,' he appears to allude to it when he says in the commencement, "I swear to you by those humble ancestors who sleep in their parish churchyards; "-humble they were, but respectable; and it is a pity that Brummell did not content himself with the position in society their industry and better judgment had secured for him, and this he was probably brought to think by the sufferings and reverses of his later life.

1 See volume II., chapter VII.

CHAPTER III.

Buck Brummell at Eton-His gentlemanly deportment—The Windsor Bargeman-The sporting High Sheriff-His novel estimate of Character-Dame Young-Description of George by the Captain of her house-His great dexterity in Toasting Cheese-His Peccadilloes -Dr. L.-Brummell enters at Oriel College, Oxford-His Con sumption of Midnight Oil there-Leaves the University-Is Gazetted to a Cornetcy in the Tenth-Introduced to the Prince of Wales-In attendance on His Royal Highness at his Marriage-The Blue Nose -Reasons for disliking the Army-Retires from the Service.

Ar Eton, to which his father sent him in 1790, at least he appears in the list of the lower school for that year, George Brummell was remarkable for his quiet. gentlemanly manners and ready wit, as well as for the excessive neatness of his personal appearance. At that time the term "dandy" was not the vogue: "bucks," and "macaronies," were then the nicknames of such as affected peculiar elegance in their dress; and, according to one authority formerly living at Eton, he was distinguished from his fellows by the sobriquet of "Buck Brummell.” The anxiety with which he eschewed the dirty streets on a rainy day, his white stock with a bright gold buckle behind, and the measured dignity of his step, were remembered by his contemporaries; his language, dress, and

deportment, were in this respect always in perfect keeping.

It frequently happened that a contest took place between the boys and the Windsor bargemen, and on one of these occasions, an unhappy bargee fell into the hands of the exasperated lads, who having been in a former row very roughly handled by these Jacob Faithfuls, gave momentary way to passion, and were literally contemplating throwing him over the bridge into the Thames. In the midst of the uproar and hauling about, fifty pulling him one way and fifty the other, Buck Brummell came over the bridge, and probably from a goodnatured motive, he, in the quietest tones of remonstrance, addressed his incensed companions as follows: "My good fellows, don't send him into the river; the man is evidently in a high state of perspiration, and it almost amounts to a certainty that he will catch cold." A finer instance of bathos seldom occurs-from drowning to catching cold! but to be sure, either might have happened, even to a bargee. This appeal of George Brummell's was irresistible; the boys took it, and in an ebullition. of laughter, projected the bargeman along the road, who took to his heels and was out of sight in an instant.

Little, however, is now remembered of Brummell at Eton; old Sukey, the purveyor of tarts and apples, died an inmate of the almshouse, but her mind was too enfeebled by age for her to recollect whether he patronised her, and if he was ever so vulgarly happy

as to enjoy cranberries, bull's-eyes, or the classical elecampane; neither have I been able to ascertain, whether like other boys he hacked his desk, or cut his name on the walls. In the upper school-room, where upwards of three thousand names are cut on the oak panelling, numbering among them those of Charles Fox, and scores of others of our young nobility and commoners scarcely less distinguished in the senate, or the field-that of George Brummell does not appear.

I was dining one day with the high sheriff of a county contiguous to the metropolis, a Nestor of Nimrods, and accidentally hearing him remark that he was at Eton in the latter part of the last century, I asked him whether he recollected Brummell there. The rough, but good humoured, old fox-hunter immediately acknowledged the acquaintance. "I knew him well, Sir," said the veteran sportsman; "he was never flogged; and a man, Sir, is not worth a d—n who was never flogged through the school." Here the conversation, to my great regret, was cut short by the under sheriff hopping into the room and announcing to his chief, who was doing the honours most admirably, that “in the great tithe cause, Smith versus Jones, a verdict had just been recorded in favour of the plaintiff." This brought on a perfect typhoon from the high sheriff, mangel wurzel, fat beasts, and the sliding-scale. I made a waiting race of it, but it was of no use; the whole of the squires present went off at score, I could never get old Hubert to hark