[11:  Another version, given by Captain Jesse, represents this to have taken place at a ball given at the Argyle Rooms in July, 1813, by Lord Alvanley, Sir Henry Miklmav, Mr. Pierrepoint, and Mr. Brummell.]

Brummell was scotched rather than killed by the Prince’s indifference.  He at once resolved to patronise his brother, the Duke of York, and found in him a truer friend.  The duchess, who had a particular fondness for dogs, of which she is said to have kept no fewer, at one time, than a hundred, added the puppy Brummell to the list, and treated him with a kindness in which little condescension was mixed.  But neither impudence nor the blood-royal can keep a man out of debt, especially when he plays.  The Beau got deeper and deeper into the difficulty, and at last some mysterious quarrel about money with a gentleman who thenceforward went by the name of Dick the Dandy-killer, obliged him to think of place and poverty in another land.  He looked in vain for aid, and among others Scrope Davies was written to to lend him ‘two hundred,’ ’because his money was all in the three per cents.’  Scrope replied laconically—­

    ’MY DEAR GEORGE,

    ’It is very unfortunate, but my money is all in the three per
    cents.  Yours,

    ‘S.  DAVIES,’

It was the last attempt.  The Beau went to the opera, as usual, and drove away from it clear off to Dover, whence the packet took him to safety and slovenliness in the ancient town of Calais.  His few effects were sold after his departure.  Porcelaine, buhl, a drawing or two, double-barrelled Mantons (probably never used), plenty of old wine, linen, furniture, and a few well-bound books, were the Beau’s assets.  His debts were with half the chief tradesmen of the West End and a large number of his personal friends.

The climax is reached:  henceforth Master George Bryan Brummell goes rapidly and gracefully down the hill of life.

The position of a Calais beggar was by no means a bad one, if the reduced individual had any claim whatever to distinction.  A black-mail was sedulously levied by the outcasts and exiles of that town on every Englishman who passed through it; and in those days it was customary to pass some short time in this entrance of France.  The English ‘residents’ were always on the look-out, generally crowding round the packet-boat, and the new arrival was sure to be accosted by some old and attached friend, who had not seen him for years.  Just as Buttons, who is always breaking the plates and tumblers, has the invariable mode of accounting for his carelessness, ’they fell apart, sir, in my ‘ands!’ so these expatriated Britons had always a tale of confidence misplaced—­security for a bond—­bail for a delinquent, or in short any hard case, which compelled them, much against their wills, to remain ‘for a period’ on the shores of France.  To such men, whom you had known in seven-guinea waistcoats at White’s and Watier’s, and found in seven-shilling coats on the Calais pier, it was impossible to refuse your five-pound note, and in time the black-mail of Calais came to be reckoned among the established expenses of a Continental tour.