File:Philip, Fourth Earl of Chesterfield.jpg

Identifier: witsbeauxbeautie00fyvi (find matches)
Title: Wits, beaux, and beauties of the Georgian era
Year: 1909 (1900s)
Authors: Fyvie, John
Subjects: Great Britain -- Court and courtiers Great Britain -- Biography Great Britain -- Social life and customs
Publisher: London : J. Lane New York, J. Lane company
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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ability to carry out his threat. It was known that whenattacked one day in the street by four men, he had keptthem all at bay until the watch came up and carried boththem and him to the round-house. And Foote doubtlesswould have heard also how, one night in the playhouse atLichfield, when a gentleman had seated himself in a chairspecially reserved between the side-scenes for Johnson,and rudely refused to give it up when politely requested,the irate and muscular author had seized hold of the chairand tossed it, and its occupant with it, into the pit. Foote.who had no mind to have his bones broken by an oakencudgel, accordingly altered his plans ; and in place ofJohnson, chose as the chief butt for his wit Alderman(icorgc Faulkner, the printer of the Dublin Journal ;a man with certain personal peculiarities, as well as thepurely accidental one of a wooden leg, which enabledthe satirist to exhibit him as a highly ludicrous figure ;but who is said to have been a respectable citizen of in-
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ti . /loayy. K..I.. fiuxt IHII.ir, KOLKTII 1:AKL Ol ClIESriCKPlKI.l)From a Picture in the National Portrait Gallery SAMUEL FOOTE 43 dustry and integrity, without any obvious and obtrusivevices or follies to justify the holding of him up to odium.Lord Chesterfield who, when viceroy, had been wellacquainted with Faulkner, wrote to the alderman in abantering style, suggesting that he should show his spiriteither by some contemptuous stricture, or by bringingan action for libel. Faulkner took the Earl at his word,brought an action in the Dublin courts, and obtained£300 damages. Whereupon Chesterfield again wrote toexpress his hearty congratulations that the other hadbeen able to make his enemy his Foot-stool, a victory, hesaid, which even the divine Socrates had not influenceenough to obtain in Athens over the Greek Aristophanes ;and alleging that he had begun to write a congratulatorypoem on the subject. How sincere Chesterfield was,however, from first to last, is evident enough from th

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