Bath under Beau Nash. By Lewis Melville. (Eveleigh Nash. 15s.
net.)—We may be allowed to congratulate ourselves on the fact that the dominimi Which Beau Nash exercised over the fashionables who gathered at Bath for fifty years and more is now inconceivable. This is net to say that this same dominion was not a good thing in its way. Richard Nash did a world of good, in one way or another, to Bath and its habitues. He kept order : if people idled, gambled; flirted, and generally wasted their time and substance, they did this de'. ently. They went to the devil with grace, the thing which Lord Chesterfield is said to have failed in inducing his much-advised son to do. The history of the man is curious. He came to Bath in 1705, when he was more than thirty years of age, being, as it would seem, without profession or means of livelihood. The one thing he had done was to direct an Inner Temple pageant. (The direction of pageants appears likely to become, for a time at least, an honourable profession.) But Nash received no "material benefit" from his work. He went to Bath in the hope of picking up something at the gaming-tables, was recognised by the Master of the Ceremonies as a kindred spirit, and succeeded to his superior's place when the latter was killed in a duel. How he bore himself in this dignity is told at length in this book. Mr. Melville has had plenty of material at his command, and has used it on the whole discreetly, though there are one or two things which he .might have omitted. That he gives us a quite consistent and intelligible picture of Richard Nash we cannot say. Probably such a thing was not possible. We are told that a "disregard ef strict honesty in money matters was a distinguishing trait of his character throughout his life." That is a somewhat puzzling statement—unless, of course, it is a misprint—for it seems to contradict some of the things that are said about him. But perhaps it is better to take the book as it stands. It is unquestionably entertaining, and it gives us an instructive picture of English manners in the first half of the eighteenth century. What a time it was ! What an idea, to take an instance trifling but significant, to think of "improving the bare prospect of Hampton Downs" by erecting Sham Castle! At Bath now they tell you it was erected to frighten..Oliver Cromwell! Dr. Oliver, famous for his biscuits, wrote an elaborate encomium on Nash, and Dr. King wrote an epitaph which is here given, not without misprints,—es for est, non anquam for non nun quam, reguim for regime, yum for turn, quod for quid, and tallem for talem.
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