The Night Side of London by James Ewing Ritchie

Was instituted for the combined purpose of encouraging drinking, and what its admirers term the noble art of self-defence. There was a time when boxing was in fashion; when but few of our noblemen and gentlemen did not take lessons in the pugilistic art. "I can assert, without fear of contradiction," writes Pierce Egan, "that I furnished the present Duke of Buccleuch with a pair of boxing-gloves and all the volumes of 'Boxiana' during his studies at Eton College. " Prince George of Cambridge learnt the rudiments of the art from young Richmond; the late Duke of Portland was a pupil of that Jackson whose name is familiar to all readers of Byron. At the first public dinner of the Pugilistic Society, held at the Thatched House Tavern, 1814, a baronet, Sir Henry Smith, was in the chair; and it is a fact, when the war with France was terminated, and the Emperor of Russia and the King of Prussia, accompanied by Blucher and Platoff, visited this country, that not anything they had witnessed appeared to interest them more than the sparring matches between Jackson, Tom Crib, Belcher, Old Dutch Sam, at a _dejeuner_ given by Lord Lowther at his mansion. Indeed, so delighted were those great masters of the art of war with the combats between those first-rate boxers, that Messrs Blucher and Platoff had a second exhibition by their own express desire at the Earl of Elgin's house. Actually even in the House of Commons Mr Wyndham favoured the House with a description, warm and glowing, of a recent contest between Richmond and Maddox, of which he had been a spectator; and it is not long since Mr Gully, a prize-fighter, represented Pontefract.

The late George IV., when Prince of Wales, was also a spectator at the fight upon a stage on Brighton Downs between Tom Tyne, a distinguished boxer, with a publican of milling notoriety. The latter was killed by a blow on his temple, and died almost upon the instant. The royal debauchee never attended another, but his brother, the late William the Fourth, was often a spectator of the matches on Moulsey Hurst. In this respect the age has made progress. Our noblemen no longer patronize the prize-ring. Our young princes have a purer taste. Yet the institution, with all its brutality and blackguardism, still exists, and in the _Advertiser_, side by side with an article bewailing the spread of German neology in our dissenting colleges, or speaking evil of such earnest workers in the wide field of philanthropy as Maurice or Kingsley, you will read of one of the beastly prize-fights which still disgrace the land. But the _Advertiser_ is the publicans' paper, and it is a fact easily understood, that the prize-fighter, when his day is over, generally keeps a public-house, which is generally called a sporting-house. A warm admirer of them writes, "Fun, civility, mirth, good-humour, and sporting events are the general theme of conversation to be met with over a cheerful glass at the above houses. " Ben Caunt's, in St Martin's-lane, is perhaps the principal one, but there are some five or six besides in various parts of the metropolis. Let us enter one. In spite of the assurance of civility and good humour, I don't think you will stay long, but will feel on a small scale what Daniel must have felt in the lions' den.