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Cabinet," who has his niche in history because of Mason's Ode, beginning

"Illustrious Pinchbeck! condescend,

Thou well-belov'd, and best King's Friend,
These lyric lines to view."

There is no record of how Pinchbeck's quarrel at Tunbridge Wells ended, but the mention of it shows that the office of Master of the Ceremonies was still at that date held in respect. Of those who, after Blake, accepted the office, scarcely any particulars have been handed down, and only their names survive. The order of succession was Richard Tyson, who issued a code of rules accepted by those who followed him; Fotheringham; Paul Amsinck, who in 1810 published a book on Tunbridge Wells and its Neighbourhood, and was declared by Mary Berry to be "the only one of his kind I ever saw very like a gentleman, and not at all a coxcomb "; Eld. T. Roberts, who was in power in 1820; Captain Merryweather; and Lieutenant Madden, R.M., who may perhaps have been that William John Madden, Captain of Marines, the son of James Madden, of Cole Hill House, Fulham, Middlesex, the brother of General Sir George Allen Madden,

and the father of Sir Frederick Madden, the distinguished antiquary. Madden held office for eleven years, and resigned at the end of the season of 1836. He was the last Master of the Ceremonies at Tunbridge Wells.

CHAPTER V

AN EIGHTEENTH CENTURY POST-BAG

FROM TUNBRIDGE WELLS

John Gay to Mrs. Howard.1

Tunbridge, July 12, 1723.

2

We have a young lady here that is very particular in her desires. I have known some ladies, who, if ever they prayed, and were sure their prayers would prevail, would ask an equipage, a title, a husband, or matadores; " but this lady, who is but seventeen, and has but thirty thousand pounds, places all her wishes in a pot of good ale. When her friends, for the sake of her shape and complexion, would dissuade her from it, she answers, with

3

1 Henrietta Howard (née Hobart) married Charles Howard, third son of Henry, fifth Earl of Suffolk, who succeeded to the Earldom in 1731.

2 Matadores constitute a good hand at ombre and quadrille.

3 Probably Miss Mary Jennings, who died, at the age of thirty, in November 1736.

[graphic][merged small]

THE HON. MRS. HOWARD, AFTERWARDS COUNTESS OF SUFFOLK

[To face p. 166

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