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Page 38
Then consider the Ministers who carried out the Sovereign's behest.
There was "Jemmy Twitcher," as Lord Sandwich was called. This man was
so utterly bad, that in later life he never cared to conceal his
infamies, because he knew that his character could not possibly be
worse blackened. Sandwich belonged to the unspeakable Medmenham Abbey
set. The lovely ruin had been bought and renovated by a gang of rakes,
who converted it into an abode of drunkenness and grossness; they
defaced the sacred trees and the grey walls with inscriptions which
the indignation of a purer age has caused to be removed; they carried
on nightly revels which no historian could describe, and in their
wicked buffoonery mocked the Creator with burlesque religious rites.
Such an unholy place would be pulled down by the mob nowadays, and the
gang of debauchees would figure in the police-court; but in those
"good old times" the Prime Minister and the Secretary to the Admiralty
were merry members of a crew that disgraced humanity. Just six weeks
after Lord Sandwich had joined the Medmenham Abbey gang, he put
himself forward for election to the High Stewardship of Cambridge
University. Here was a pretty position! The man had been thus
described by a poet--
"Too infamous to have a friend,
Too bad for bad men to commend
Or good to name; beneath whose weight
Earth groans; who hath been spared by fate
Only to show on mercy's plan
How far and long God bears with man"--
and this superb piece of truculence was received with applause by all
that was upright and noble in England. This indescribable villain
presented himself as worthy to preside over the place where the flower
of English youth were educated. A pleasing example he offered to young
and ardent souls! Worst of all, he was elected. He adroitly gained the
votes of country clergymen; he begged his friends to solicit the votes
of their private chaplains; he dodged and manoeuvred until he gained
his position. One voter came from a lunatic asylum, another was
brought from the Isle of Man, others were bribed in lavish
fashion--and Sandwich presided over Cambridge. The students rose in a
body and walked out when he came among them; but that mattered little
to the brazen fellow. To complete the ghastly comedy, it happened that
four years later the Chancellorship fell vacant, and the Duke of
Grafton, who was only second to "Jemmy Twitcher" in wickedness, was
chosen for the high office.
Now I ask plainly, "Can the croakers declare that England was better
under Grafton and 'Jemmy Twitcher' than she now is?" It is nonsense!
The crew of bacchanals and blackguards who then flaunted in high
places would not now be tolerated for a day. I look on our governing
class now,[3] and I may safely declare that not more than one Cabinet
Minister during the past twenty years has been regarded as otherwise
than stainless in character. What is the meaning of this
transformation? It means that good, pure women have gained their
rightful influence, that men have grown purer, and that the elevation
of the general body of society has been reflected in the character of
the men chosen to rule. Vice is all too powerful, and the dark corners
of our cities are awful to see; but the worst of the "fast" men in
modern England are not so bad as were the governors of a mighty empire
when George III. was king.
[3] 1886.
If we look at the society that diced and drank and squandered health
and fortune in the times which we mention, we are more than ever
struck with the advance made. It is a literal fact that the
correspondence of the young men mainly refers to drink and gaming, the
correspondence of the middle-aged men to gout. There were few of the
educated classes who reached middle age, and a country squire was
reckoned quite a remarkable person if he could still walk and ride
when he attained to fifty years. The quiet, steady middle-class
certainly lived more temperately; but the intemperance of the
aristocracy was indescribable. The leader of the House of Lords
imbibed until six every morning, was carried to bed, and came down
about two in the afternoon; two noblemen declared that they drank a
gallon and a half of Champagne and Burgundy at one sitting; in some
coffee-houses it was the custom, when the night's drinking ended, for
the company to burn their wigs. Some of Horace Walpole's letters prove
plainly enough that great gentlemen conducted themselves occasionally
very much as wild seamen would do in Shadwell or the Highway. What
would be thought if Lord Salisbury reeled into the House in a totally
drunken condition? The imagination cannot conceive the situation, and
the fact that the very thought is laughable shows how much we have
improved in essentials. In bygone days, a man who became a Minister
proceeded to secure his own fortune; then he provided for all his
relatives, his hangers-on, his very jockeys and footmen. One lord held
eight sinecure offices, and was besides colonel of two regiments. A
Chancellor of the Exchequer cleared four hundred thousand on a new
loan, and the bulk of this large sum remained in his own pocket, for
he had but few associates to bribe. When patrols were set to guard the
Treasury at night, an epigram ran--
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