MR. LINDSAY'S book reads like a high-class low- trade newspaper;
rape, robbery, ruin, birth, death, a disaster, wagers, wars and whores—there is some- thing for everyone; it is readable, vivid and full of interesting and amusing life. The first week of October is characteristic : a poor man rushed from a workhouse, cut his throat and castrated himself, but was happily sewn up by a surgeon; a sailor 0 and a whore broke down a 'boghouse' by their vigour and sank to their chins in nightsoil: Wesley Preached; some Negro slaves died aboard a ship errnm Jamaica; a large gang rescued a sodomist 1,rnin the police and carried 'him off in triumph; '-ove for Love was performed at Covent Garden; the Duke of Devonshire died; a glass-blower drank a quart of aniseed water in fifty-four minutes for a wager and died in convulsions; a 'rimier of a porter cellar 'kicked his wife about the privy parts' and she died; the Duke of Cum- berland had 'gout-twitches'; a soldier sold his erring wife for eight guineas on condition that her new husband should 'nevermore cohabit with' her; and Wesley preached again. According to the blurb all this adds up to 'an authentic, colourful, comprehensive picture of eighteenth-century life.' But unfortunately it doesn't. For Mr. Lindsay's picture is sadly dis- it/rted. He simply cannot resist the sensational. Take rapes. P His list includes an old woman of ninety taken by her grandson, a boy of six, some young girls and an old man of unspecified age. The eighteenth century's tastes were often odd, .i,111 to suggest that this was a ravisher's usual fare is to strain one's credulity. It also seems a little unfair that, in the index, homosexuality should get six mentions and prostitution none at all. Prosti- tutes certainly appear in the text but perhaps Mr. Lindsay regards them, as he regards Namier who A also omitted from the index, as people whose services can be accepted without acknowledge- ment. In addition, the book bristles with errors of every variety—historical, factual and grammatical. The index is incomplete and the bibliography bedside bizarre. For all this it remains an excellent bedside book--rather like an historical News of the World in stiff covers, over 300 pages of all the quaint hehaviour known to the human condi- tion,and scarcely a word of explanation.
NEIL MCKENDRICK
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