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Gambling

In the midst of the infatuated votaries of the gambling god in England, towers the mighty intellectual giant Charles James Fox. Nature had fashioned him to be equally an object of admiration and love. In addition to powerful eloquence, he was distinguished by the refinement of his taste in all matters connected with literature and art; he was deeply read in history; had some claims to be regarded as a poet; and possessed a thorough knowledge of the classical authors of antiquity, a knowledge of which he so often and so happily availed himself in his seat in the House of Commons. To these qualities was added a good-humour which was seldom ruffled,--a peculiar fascination of manner and address,--the most delightful powers of conversation,--a heart perfectly free from vindictiveness, ostentation, and deceit,--a strong sense of justice,--a thorough detestation of tyranny and oppression,--and an almost feminine tenderness of feeling for the sufferings of others.

Click to read about Fox's love of gambling...

Unfortunately, however, his great talents and delightful qualities in private life rendered his defects the more glaring and lamentable; indeed, it is difficult to think or speak with common patience of those injurious practices and habits-that abandonment to self-gratification, and that criminal waste of the most transcendent abilities which exhausted in social conviviality and the gambling table what were formed to confer blessings on mankind.

So much for the character of Fox, as I have gathered from Mr Jesse;[123] and I continue the extremely interesting subject by quoting from that delightful book, `The Queens of Society.'[124] `With a father who had made an enormous fortune, with little principle, out of a public office--for Lord Holland owed the bulk of his wealth to his appointment of paymaster to the forces,--and who spoiled him, in his boyhood, Charles James Fox had begun life _AS A FOP OF THE FIRST WATER_, and squandered L50,000 in debt before he became of age.

Afterwards he indulged recklessly and extravagantly in every course of
licentiousness which the profligate society of the day opened to him. At Brookes' and the Thatched House Fox ate and drank to excess, threw thousands upon the Faro table, mingled with blacklegs, and made himself notorious for his shameless vices. Newmarket supplied another xcitement. It was impossible that such a life should not destroy every principle of honour; and there is nothing improbable in the story that he appropriated to himself money which belonged to his dear friend Mrs Crewe, as before related.

[123] George Selwyn and his Contemporaries, ii.
[124] By Grace and Philip Wharton.

`Of his talents, which were certainly great, he made an affected display. Of his learning he was proud--but rather as adding lustre to his celebrity for universal tastes. He was not at all ashamed, but rather gloried in being able to describe himself as a fool, as he does in his verses to Mrs Crewe:-- "Is't reason? No; that my whole life will belie;
For, who so at variance as reason and I?
Is't ambition that fills up each chink in my heart,
Nor allows any softer sensation a part?
Oh! no; for in this all the world must agree,
one folly was never sufficient for me."

`Sensual and self-indulgent--with a grossness that is even patent on his very portrait [and bust], Fox had nevertheless a manner which enchanted the sex, and he was the only politician of the day who thoroughly enlisted the personal sympathies of women of mind and character, as well as of those who might be captivated by his profusion. When he visited Paris in later days, even Madame Recamier, noted for her refinement, and of whom he himself said, with his usual coarse ideas of the sphere of woman, that "she was the only woman who united the attractions of pleasure to those of modesty," delighted to be seen with him! At the time of which we are speaking the most celebrated beauties of England were his most ardent supporters.

`The election of 1784, in which he stood and was returned for Westminster, was one of the most famous of the old riotous political demonstrations. . . . . Loving _hazard_ of all kinds for its own sake, Fox had made party hostility a new sphere of gambling, had adopted the character of a demagogue, and at a time when the whole of Europe was undergoing, a great revolution in principles, was welcomed gladly as "The Man of the People." In the beginning, of the year he had been convicted of bribery, but in spite of this his popularity increased. . . . The election for Westminster, in which Fox was opposed by Sir Cecil Wray, was the most tempestuous of all. There were 20,000 votes to be polled, and the opposing parties resorted to any means of intimidation, or violence, or persuasion which political enthusiasm could suggest. On the eighth day the poll was against the popular member, and he called upon his friends to make a great effort on his behalf. It was then that the "ladies' canvass" began. Lady Duncannon, the Duchess of Devonshire, Mrs Crewe, and Mrs Damer dressed themselves in blue and buff-the colours of the American Independents, which Fox had adopted and wore in the House of Commons--and set out to visit the purlieus of Westminster. Here, in their enthusiasm, they shook the dirty hands of honest workmen, expressed the greatest interest in their wives and families, and even, as in the case of the Duchess of Devonshire and the butcher, submitted their fair cheeks to be kissed by the possessors of votes! At the butcher's shop, the owner, in his apron and sleeves, stoutly refused his vote, except on one condition--"Would her Grace give him a kiss?" The request was granted; and the vote thus purchased went to swell the majority which finally secured the return of "The Man of the People."

`The colouring of political friends, which concealed his vices,
or rather which gave them a false hue, has long since faded away.
We now know Fox as he _WAS_. In the latest journals of Horace
Walpole his inveterate gambling, his open profligacy, his utter
want of honour, is disclosed by one of his own opinion.
Corrupted ere yet he had left his home, whilst in age a boy,
there is, however, the comfort of reflecting that he outlived his
vices which seem to have "cropped out" by his ancestral
connection in the female line with the reprobate Charles II.,
whom he was thought to resemble in features. Fox,
afterwards, with a green apron tied round his waist, pruning and
nailing up his fruit trees at St Ann's Hill, or amusing himself
innocently with a few friends, is a pleasing object to remember,
even whilst his early career occurs forcibly to the mind.'

Peace, then, to the shade of Charles James Fox! The three last public acts which he performed were worthy of the man, and should suffice to prove that, in spite of his terrible failings, he was most useful in his generation. By one, he laboured to repair the outrages of war--to obtain a breathing time for our allies; and, by an extension of our commerce, to afford, if necessary, to his country all the advantages of a renovated contest, without the danger of drying up our resources. By another, he attempted to remove all legal disabilities arising out of religion--to unite more closely the interests of Ireland with those of England; and thus, by an extension of common rights, and a participation of common benefits, wisely to render that which has always been considered the weakest and most troublesome portion of our empire, at least a useful and valuable part of England's greatness among the nations. Queen Elizabeth's Minister, Lord Burleigh, in the presence of the `Irish difficulty' in his day, wished Ireland at the bottom of the sea, and doubtless many at the present time wish the same; but Fox endeavoured to grapple with it manfully and honestly, and it was not his fault that he did not settle it. The vices of Fox were those of the age in which he lived; had he been reserved for the present epoch, what a different biography should we have to write of him! What a helmsman he might be at the present time, when the ship of Old England is at sea and in peril!

It appears from a letter addressed by Lord Carlisle to Lady
Holland (Fox's mother) in 1773, that he had become security for
Fox to the amount of fifteen or sixteen thousand pounds; and a
letter to Selwyn in 1777, puts the ruinous character of their
gambling transactions in the strongest light. Lord Ilchester
(Fox's cousin) had lost thirteen thousand pounds at one sitting
to Lord Carlisle, who offered to take three thousand pounds down.
Nothing was paid. But ten years afterwards, when Lord Carlisle
pressed for his money, he complained that an attempt was made to
construe the offer into a _remission_ of the ten thousand
pounds:--`The only way, in honour, that Lord Ilchester could
have accepted my offer, would have been by taking some steps to
pay the L3000. I remained in a state of uncertainty, I think,
for nearly three years; but his taking no notice of it during
that time, convinced me that he had no intention of availing
himself of it. Charles Fox was also at a much earlier period
clear that he never meant to accept it. There is also great
injustice in the behaviour of the family in passing by the
instantaneous payment of, I believe, five thousand pounds, to
Charles, won at the same sitting, without any observations. _At
one period of the play I remember there was a balance in favour
of one of these gentlemen (but which I protest I do not remember) of about fifty thousand_.'

At the time in question Fox was hardly eighteen. The following letter from Lord Carlisle, written in 1771, contains highly interesting information respecting the youthful habits and already vast intellectual pre-eminence of this memorable statesman:--`It gives me great pain to hear that Charles begins to be unreasonably impatient at losing. I fear it is the prologue to much fretfulness of temper, for disappointment in raising money, and any serious reflections upon his situation, will (in spite of his affected spirits and dissipation) occasion him many disagreeable moments.' Lord Carlisle's fears proved groundless in this respect. As before stated, Fox was always remarkable for his sweetness of temper, which remained with him to the last; but it is most painful to think how much mankind has lost through his recklessness.

Gibbon writes to Lord Sheffield in 1773, `You know Lord Holland is paying Charles Fox's debts. They amount to L140,000.'[125]

[125] Timbs, _Club Life in London_.

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