THE SCHOOL FOR SCANDAL

By Kristine Hughes

In 1777, London was one tenth of it's present size, but at 700,000 was by far the biggest city in Britain - the next largest was Bristol with 50,000 and Norwich with 30,000. London was the social, fashionable, political, artistic and intellectual centre of the nation and most people considered it the only place to be. Mrs. Delaney wrote a friend in 1771, "I doubt very much whether you will get a servant that has been used to London that will sit down quietly in the country; there seems to be universal dissipation of manners from the highest to the lowest and y cook . . who was a most desirable servant, said that she could not live in the country, it was so melancholy."

The select part of London was St. James's, going up to Mayfair, which was still a market. Kensington and Chelsea were villages; Chelsea Hospital stood amidst hayfields and there were trees either side of Tottenham Court Road, which led to Islington, whose main industry was cow keeping. But London was quickly growing. In "Humphrey Clinker (1771), Smollet wrote, "London is literally new to me, new in its streets, houses, even its situation . . what I left open fields, producing hay and corn, I now find covered with streets and squares, palaces and churches . . if this infatuation continues for half a century, I suppose the whole county of Middlesex will be covered with brick."

There were only three bridges over the Thames, the river yet a major means of transport. Only twenty-five years before publication of The School for Scandal, the last traitors' heads were displayed on pikes at Temple Bar, where people rented out spyglasses "at a halfpenny a look." London's shops were world famous. A foreign visitor wrote in 1770 that, "the magnificance of the shops is the most striking thing in London. They sometimes extend without interruption for an English mile." A handbook called "The London Tradesman" advisedshopkeepers how to behave towards their clients - especially in being able to hand a lady into her coach "without being seized with a palpitation of the heart at the touch of a delicate hand."

Newspapers and Scandal

In 1777 there were eight daily morning newspapers in London with a combined circulation of 2,800. Nine evening papers were printed three times per week at five in the afternoon, in order to meet departure time of the coaches bound for the country. Most newspapers and magazines of the day feature some type of gossip column, with "Town and Country Magazine" having a section devoted to it whilst "The Chronicle" was itself comprised of scandalous news. The high society circle in which Sheridan's characters move was not a large one. Henry Fielding's definition of "nobody" was, "all the people in Great Britain except about 1,200." Remember that only 1.2% of the population owned land and there were only about 400 families whose income was above five thousand pounds, or three hundred fifty pounds today. Not only did everyone in this circle know about each other, but they were mad for the gossip about one another. When Lady Sarah Bunbury, daughter of the Duke of Richmond, ran away from her husband with Lord William Gordon, they lived openly together in Berwickshire. A reporter from "Town and Country Magazine" visited the couple and wrote an article from which the following is taken: AMOROUS INTELLIGENCE: Knocking at the door of a cottage to obtain information, Lord William Gordon opened the door and offered me hospitality in the house where to my infinite surprise I found the charming and astonished to find that a mutual satisfaction seemed to reign in their countenances, that they dwelt with pleasure on their reciprocal accomplished LSB (Lady Sarah). I was greatly passion,which was still visibly glowing in its primitive ardour. Nay, the very step that had banished them from the world and banished them to their present retreat afforded them a solace for any little temporary wants and they glorified in having risked ALL FOR LOVE." Sir William Bunbury, Lady Sarah's husband, was a keen owner and breeder of horses and the article continues: the world are now divided in their opinion whether "B" deserves most pity or contempt. This we shall leave the reader to determine; only observing that this history may serve as a lesson to deter the vain-glorious part of mankind from choosing their helpmates from motives of false ambition or having chosen them, to pay less attention to their wives than their horses."

Once contracted, society marriages hardly ever resulted in divorce, which was difficult to obtain, so couples who did not enjoy mutual satisfaction after marriage turned to separation instead. In these cases, a husband agreed to provide an annual maintenance for his wife and she absolved him from any future responsibility for her debts. More often, however, the unhappy husband and wife simply decided to remain under the same roof, but to live separate lives for all intents and purposes. The mid-Georgian period, in fact, was extremely tolerant of adultery. In 1753, George II took a new mistress and the Queen said of the matter that she, "was sorry for the scandal it gave to others, but for herself she minded it no more than his going to the close stool."

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