from the great glare of the lamps, and, to keep their curls in order,

broad-brimmed hats covered with flowers. They were masked to conceal

their excitement, especially when playing the game of quinze. All,

moreover, had their coats turned the wrong way, for luck. Lord David was

a member of the Beefsteak Club, the Surly Club, and of the Splitfarthing

Club, of the Cross Club, the Scratchpenny Club, of the Sealed Knot, a

Royalist Club, and of the Martinus Scribblerus, founded by Swift, to

take the place of the Rota, founded by Milton.

Though handsome, he belonged to the Ugly Club. This club was dedicated

to deformity. The members agreed to fight, not about a beautiful woman,

but about an ugly man. The hall of the club was adorned by hideous

portraits--Thersites, Triboulet, Duns, Hudibras, Scarron; over the

chimney was Æsop, between two men, each blind of an eye, Cocles and

Camoëns (Cocles being blind of the left, Camoëns of the right eye), so

arranged that the two profiles without eyes were turned to each other.

The day that the beautiful Mrs. Visart caught the small pox the Ugly

Club toasted her. This club was still in existence in the beginning of

the nineteenth century, and Mirabeau was elected an honorary member.

Since the restoration of Charles II. revolutionary clubs had been

abolished. The tavern in the little street by Moorfields, where the

Calf's Head Club was held, had been pulled down; it was so called

because on the 30th of January, the day on which the blood of Charles I.

flowed on the scaffold, the members had drunk red wine out of the skull

of a calf to the health of Cromwell. To the republican clubs had

succeeded monarchical clubs. In them people amused themselves with

316

The Man Who Laughs