Morals and Manners in the Time of George III.

Colonist, Issue 133, 28 January 1859, Page 4

Morals and Manners in the Time of George 111.

The gardens on the Surrey side of the river were frequented by persons of fashion up to a recent period; but no person now living has witnessed the debaucheries which . were of nightly occurrence at Vauxhall from the time of Queen Anne to an advanced period of the reign of George 111. The boxes were scenes of drunkenness and riot.. The dark vistas and secluded alleys were infamous for still more heinous vice and crime. A lady, who, by-a; chance which frequently occurred, lost for a few minutes the protection of her party,: was in imminent danger of insult or even outrage. Young women of every condition were,' in every place of public resort, unless vigilantly watched, exposed to impertinence from persons who by social position were entitled to be called gentlemen. In nine cases out of ten, indeed, such advances would not be met with resentment; and when it happened that a gallant was so unfortunate as to encounter a lady to .whom his insolent addresses were unacceptable it was not without the greatest difficulty that she could escape from her incredulous persecutor. The lessee of Vauxhall made an attempt, in 1764, to retrench the de r j bauchery which made it scandalous, if not

unsafe,*-for. any decent wom_m to. enter, the gardens. He > closed, the secluded walks, and lit up the recesses; but the young gentlemen of fashion, resenting this!invasion of their licence, immediately tore, down tlie barriers, and put out the new lights. This period may, perhaps, with some degree of accuracy, be fixed as that at which the depravity of manners reached the extreme point. For the* preceding thirty or forty years, the relaxation of moral and religious restraint had been on the increase. Unless we are to discredit the concurrent testimony of the pulpit, the press, the stage, "the records of courts of justice, private letters, and tradition, which has hardly; ceased to be recent, it is manifest that the depravity of manners in this country, from the accession of the house of Hanover to the end, at least, of the first ten years of George 111., was not excelled in the decline of the Roman Empire, or in the decay of the old French monarchy. The marriage-tie was treated with levity by people of the highest rank and fashion; and many wives, as well as husbands,, lived in almost open disregard of their marriage vows. Incontinence was by no means rare among unmarried ladies of good family, and appears not to have materially prejudiced their matrimonial prospects. The facilities afforded by the ' numerous public places, of resort tehded mtrinly to encourage licentious intercourse,-and' for that reason were denounced by- almost every writer and speaker who .inveighed against the profligacy of the times. The Bishop of London, in his charge to the clergy in 1750, denounced the places of diversion as mere places of assignation; and in a debate upon . a Divorce Bill,, in the House of Commons, 20 years later, the reformation of manners was pronounced to be hopeless so long, as Almack's, Coornely's, the Coterie, and other places of rendezvous of a similar character, were suffered to exist*