And to see Regency Bath brought to life by genuinely expert guides, Strictly Jane Austen is where you start. They also make a wonderful gift for the Janite in your life. You'll find them at strictlyjanausten.com and we will put a link in the show notes.

Today's episode has duels fought over a runaway marriage. It has a scandal so severe it drove one of England's richest men into exile. It has the truth about those elegant public baths we're actually like to get into, which is considerably less charming than the paintings suggest. It has quack doctors selling electricity as medicine and a notorious celestial bed that promised to cure infertility for fifty pounds a night.

It has vanished pleasure gardens, a vulgar villa, a ferry ride that went badly wrong, and two of the great women of English letters falling out spectacularly over their choice of husbands. and it has James Boswell behaving exactly as you would expect James Boswell to behave. My guest today is Dr. Moira Rudolf, historian of Georgia and Regency Bath,

She tells me Jane Austen pops up in nearly all of today's categories, which I think tells us something about Jane Austen. Moira, to the Anglotopia Podcast.

I must stress that at the time that he first got to know Elizabeth, he was only 18 years old and was absolutely unknown and also penniless. I can tell you that by the late 1760s, Elizabeth's father, Thomas Linley, was the most influential musician.

and like an impresario in Bath and like many impresarios and I'm thinking particularly about Mozart's father Leopold and in more recent history Michael Jackson's father Joe Jackson. Well Elizabeth's father Thomas Linley bullied all his children into becoming child

prodigies and Elizabeth, although still in her teens, was already a celebrated singer. Now the family lived at Linley House. Linley House is just off Pierpont Street in Bath, leading into Old Orchard Street and it is marked by two

pineapple sculptures by the door. Very close to Bath's first theatre royal, 1750, which is now Freemasons Hall. And it's adjacent to a splendid Roman Doric style and archway constructed by the great Bath architect John Wood the Elder.

And now in 1770, Thomas Sheridan, that is Richard's father, a former actor and elocutionist arrived in Bath and accompanying him was his 18-year-old son, Richard. And they settled into the now lost Kingsmead Street, which actually was bombed during

World War II, the Bath Blitz, 1942. 13th of October, 1770, Richard Brinsley Sheridan wrote to a friend, there is a Mr. Linley here, a music master who has a daughter that sings like an angel. The father too sings in a particular natural style. The public concerts do not begin until after Christmas.

but we heard them at a private one in Mr. Linley's house. That December, Elizabeth, who was then only 16, became engaged to a much older man, a Mr. Long - wealthy landowner who was in his 60s. A few months later, she broke off the engagement, but despite this and possibly in her

in the hope that he would win her back. He showered her with money and jewels. At this point, a married man, and this is a real villain, Captain Matthews, again much, much older than Elizabeth, appeared in hot pursuit of her and spread the rumor that she was his mistress. Alas.

That was a rumour that many people were prepared to accept. I think a little bit like actresses who I move on to later, singers and people who performed were often regarded as possibly high-class courtesans when in many cases they weren't at all. They were perfectly respectable and well-organised people.

Elizabeth was distraught, especially when the intrigue became the juiciest bit of celebrity gossip in the Herald of Bath. Elizabeth's nickname really was the Maid of Bath. 26th of June, 1771, a play of that name opened at the Haymarket's Little Theatre.

excuse me, Little Theatre in London. And it was written by Samuel Foote, F-O-O-T-E, Samuel Foote, the one legged actor. Those who don't know anything about Samuel Foote, it's a wonderful story. See Ian Kelly's splendid biography, Mr. Foote's Other Leg. Well, anyway.

The play written by Samuel Foote came out with a prologue by the great actor, Tragedian David Garrick. And it featured a Miss Lynette being pursued by a rich old man who was played by Foote, a Matthews-like figure. And it was very unfortunate that the, that week's Bath Chronicle

declared it to be based on fact. Some three weeks later, the damage had already been done. The play was closed down on account of its personality. Elizabeth was delighted when it was closed down, but distraught because her reputation had already been sullied.

18th March 1772, Richard Sheridan and Elizabeth eloped from Number 11, Royal Crescent, to France. And it is said that their escape carriage is still occasionally heard and on rare occasions seen. that's another story.

possibly reserved for another time. At that stage, Elizabeth believed that Sheridan had rescued her from an impossible situation because what she planned to do was enter a convent. There were many in Bath who were very annoyed by this event, including the distinguished artist.

Thank you, pardon. The distinguished artist Thomas Gainsborough, who noted, Miss Linley is walked off, sure enough, with young Sheridan, but he is not at the bottom of the mischief. Matthews is a scoundrel, supposed, and with much reason to have undone the poor girl. It vexes me much because I was just finishing her picture for the exhibition.

Now further research here required, I'm assuming this is possibly the Royal Academy exhibition or it may have been an exhibition at his own house. Matthews, of course, had meanwhile placed a notice in the Chronicle insulting Sheridan and slandering Elizabeth's character. And Sheridan waited until they reached France before he confessed his true

intentions to Elizabeth, which were he could not be content to leave her in a convent unless she consented to a previous marriage, which all along had been the object of his hopes. And she must be aware that after the step she had taken, she could not appear in England, but as his wife. So in fact,

Sheridan had rather cleverly manoeuvred her into a certain position. She consented, they were married in France, but as they were both minors the marriage was invalid. Now Mr. Linley, the father, tracked them down, persuaded them to return to England.

The marriage was kept secret and they went their separate ways. Elizabeth to Bath and Sheridan to London. But when Sheridan, then 20, read Matthew's notice, he challenged him to a duel. So it was in 1772, after the invalid marriage and before the real one, that Sheridan fought.

two jewels over Elizabeth's honor. The first in London, short and bloodless, was scheduled for Hyde Park. But when that was too busy, the men repaired to the nearby Hercules Tavern. This was on the site of number one London, later became Lord Wellington's house.

and on Hyde Park Corner That was also unsuitable, so they reconvened at the now defunct Castle Tavern, Henrietta Street Covent Garden. Matthews lost his sword, forced to beg for his life, as well as sign a retraction of the published article. But alas, he refused to accept the defeat as final and he challenged

Sheridan to another duel. Sheridan wasn't obliged to accept but risked becoming a social pariah if he didn't. Now this one, 1st July 1772, was fought at Kingsdown just outside Bath and this was absolutely ferocious. Both men broke their swords

carried on fighting in a desperate struggle for life and honor. Both were wounded, Sheridan dangerously, and he was moved from the field with part of Matthew's weapon sticking through his ear, his bloodied body covered in wounds, and his face beaten to a pulp with the hilt.

of his assailant sword. So I think in many ways they disobey the dueling code, which I won't go into. It's complicated. He was taken to the White Hart Inn in Stall Street. That's directly opposite the side entrance to today's pump room. Now no longer exists. Where he lay seriously ill for

eight days. Elizabeth nursed him back to health and Matthews meanwhile had made off in a post-chase.

a nice little detail to you. In the garden of Number 14 North Parade, just under the arch of the present day, which didn't exist in Sheridan's time, North Bridge, is a small pediment of folly, vermiculated, that is drilled to represent volcanic rock.

with a little arched alcove and it looks as though it's in the style of William Kent, architect. And this, I'm certain, is a structure which originally stood in Harrison's Walks, the nearby pleasure garden in 1734 and the one in which Elizabeth and Sheridan left little love messages.

for each other. At last, 1773, the couple were legally married in London with her father's consent and they set up home and hospitality, great style. Sheridan decided to try his hand at playwriting, at which Elizabeth retired from singing. On the one hand,

She disliked performing in public. On the other, though, Sheridan thought it unbecoming that gentleman's wife should sing for money. So effectively, I think he forbade Elizabeth to continue performing. OK, his first play, The Rivals, for me the most famous one, came out in 1775.

produced at London's Covent Garden, absolute failure on the first night, after which he rapidly revised, rewrote it, and replaced the actor to rapture success. Now, although Bath's gravel walk has a former dueling ground, and for many is associated with the rival,

The true site of the would-be duel in that play is Kingsmead Fields, close to the river on the southwest side of the city, bounded by the present day Green Park Buildings West. And Sheridan's most famous play, The School for Scandal, premiered at Drury Lane in 1777.

Now he was very successful as a Whig politician that was between 1780 and 1812 supporting at least three constituencies and he also at the time owned Theatre Royal Drury Lane. It must have been hectic but fun. Hordes of people turned up in the public galleries to hear him speaking in Parliament.

because apparently he was a completely hilarious, witty, entertaining and mesmerizing speaker. So, after the drama of the start of the relationship and their obvious love for each other, the marriage wasn't a success. Although they did have a son together, Thomas, Tom Sheridan, 1775, only lived till 1817, and

he went on to have a theatrical career. Sheridan quickly tired of Elizabeth and was serially unfaithful to her. She was to him too, but they remained lifelong friends. 1792, she gave birth to a daughter who tragically died in an infancy. Now this was Mary.

Sheridan treated Mary as absolutely his own child. Her biological father was thought to be Lord Edward Fitzgerald. The same year Elizabeth died of tuberculosis after a long and lingering illness, possibly the worst symptoms provoked by the pregnancy and long labour.

and she died at Hotwells in Bristol. Sheridan remained distraught. He lived another 24 years, but despite his theatrical and political successes, he died in poverty and was buried in Poets Corner, Westminster Abbey. In the times though, there was rather a nasty attack. And I'm quoting,

Never were such gifts as those which Providence showered upon Mr. Sheridan so abused. Never were talents so miserably perverted. The term greatness has been most ridiculously applied to one who, to speak charitably of him, was the weakest of men. I have yet to find out who contributed that.

Okay.

He actually read and cataloged his books and knew the contents of them. Anyway, William Beckford. Okay. Often, as I'm walking along, guiding people through Bath, there's a viewpoint at Margaret's buildings just off Brock Street, which connects

the Royal Crescent and the Circus, where you can catch sight of a splendid tower. People often quite reasonably ask, is that Beckford's Tower? And I have to say, no, it isn't. It's the tower, 1838 to 1840, of St. Stephen's, Lundstown. You can't see Beckford Tower from a viewpoint

anywhere in central Bath because it's up a very steep, challenging hill, very steep incline. Now Beckford himself, 1760 lived through to 1844, eccentric, knowledgeable collector, connoisseur, great interest in the Gothic.

and I'm spelling that with a C rather than a K. The sublime and dramatic he liked as well. He inherited at age 10 from sainthood in his eyes, his father Alderman Beckford, who was twice Lord Mayor of London. Now Beckford's fortune, Alderman Beckford's fortune derived from

the Aldermans Jamaican sugar plantations and his Wiltshire estate, Fonthill, 50 miles east of Salisbury out on the plain. The young Beckford really intensely disliked the Palladian family, the Swagger Mansion, Fonthill Splendence which

dates from around 1755, except for the cellars, which were dark and extensive. And apparently as a youngster, he hugely enjoyed running around in those. When he came of age, so I'm assuming at that time, age 21, he began building a modest Gothic summer house.

up on Font Hill Ridge, somewhere to picnic or perhaps stay overnight. May 1783, age 23, Beckford, and he now turns out, it looks as though Beckford was bisexual, married Lady Margaret Gordon, who was the daughter of the fourth Earl of Aboyne

1784 he went into exile abroad and this was as a result of a major scandal when his letters to the apparently poisonous William 'Kitty', 'Kitty' of Verticomers Courtenay who was later the ninth Earl of Devon, Pardochem Castle, were intercepted by Kitty's uncle.

who detailed Beckford's dalliance in the newspapers. Kitty, unfortunately, was 10 years old when he first met the 18-year-old Beckford. Around six years later, Beckford was discovered by a houseguest to be whipping Courtney in some posture or other after finding a letter

penned by Kitty to another lover. At the same time though, looks as though Beckford also may have conducted a simultaneous affair with his cousin Peter, Peter's wife, Louisa Pitt. But I need to do a little more research on that. The exile was self-imposed. That was in

1784 and lasted until 1795. It permanently ruined his reputation, cost him a hopeful political career and ensured that he was shunned by polite society. Although it inspired his best known work, Vathek published in 1784.

1786 and allegedly written overnight, though was certainly written in French. It was in France at the time. And that has much more to do with the exotic and the fabulous than it has to do with the Gothic.

Now exile, it sounded like a terrible confinement, but in fact he didn't confine his exile to France. He wandered all across Europe, Switzerland, Italy, Spain and Portugal. And he was also accompanied by his long suffering and I think very understanding wife, Margaret.

who sadly died in childbirth in Portugal. The entourage he traveled with was so huge that he was often mistaken for the emperor of Austria. And especially so when he began to collect priceless artworks, books, porcelain, paintings, pieces of furniture.

objects of virtue which actually became a lifelong passion.

at which the project escalated. And what actually sprang up was an utterly sublime, sensational, gothic extravaganza. Secret workings day and night behind a forbidding 12 foot high surrounding wall and all sorts of public rumour, intrigue, speculation. And Fonthill Abbey

eventually emerged as a gigantic cruciform building sporting a 276 foot high tower. The opening night, the opening ceremony, which was very lavish, involved Beckford in lots of meticulous stage planning.

And I think publicity. It was a visit of Lord Nelson and his notorious mistress, Emma Hamilton. Polyphonic music echoing through the trees, distant colored lights and hooded and cowled monks holding flaming torches aloft on an incomplete and dangerous looking stair.

Much supping and drinking, the building wasn't anywhere near finished. 1822, Beckford was forced by financial circumstances to scale back a little. So he disposed of the Fonthill estate. It was sold to a Scottish merchant, John Farquhar, and he redacted

to Bath, but I have to say he was still by anyone's normal standards immensely rich. First of all, he launched at 66 Great Pulteney Street. That was a very respectable new residential quarter, but he soon moved to Lansdown Crescent where he bought the end house number 20.

as well as the adjacent house, number one, Lansdown Place West. Between the two, there was a little roadway which led to the muse behind Lansdown Crescent. And what he did was link this with a bridge, which is decorated actually with, I'm not sure if that iron, I think that probably

copper alloys very striking decoration. And he linked those two properties with this bridge in which he subsequently housed part of his library. Some years later, 1832, he sold number 11, Lansdown Place, number one, I beg your pardon, Lansdown Place West, but he bought

He retained the library, the link, but he bought two more houses, numbers 18 and 19 in 1836. 19 he houses main library in and then in order to ensure absolute peace and quiet kept number 18 empty. And I think actually this business

of him becoming sort of reclusive, probably dates from rattling around in Fonthill Abbey and then hiding really in Bath. 1825 to 26, he commissioned a young architect, H.E. Goodrich, to build his private contemplative retreat, Beckford's Tower, which was at the very top of Lansdown.

which I think is one of the most forbidding, sinister, and I'm sure the most haunted buildings I've ever stayed in. There is a flat there which is run and managed by the Landmark Trust and therefore can be let to various people. And I can tell you I have never been so frightened in my life. A very, very creepy place.

There are those many jolly accounts of Beckford's progress to his tower, very theatrical rides and walks with Beckford immaculately dressed on horseback, sometimes walking, very fit, trailing an enfilade of stewards and grooms with six

yapping hounds trailing behind them and he would leave the market garden area behind Lansdown Crescent to go through an embattled gateway which he had caused to be put as part of his driveway. Quite complicated landscape gardening.

which bound to the picturesque. And there was also a grotto and a chinoiserie building. The Bath Preservation Trust continue to care for all of this. And what they're doing is working to reinstate parts of Beckford's Drive and reacquire furniture that were once part of Beckford's Tower.

A couple of interesting facts. Beckford, when at the top of his tower, would have been able to see on a clear day the 276 foot high tower of Fonthill and would one day have noticed with dismay much later that it had gone, it had disappeared. Now, what had happened was

Wyatt's contractor, James Wyatt didn't know anything about this, confessed on his deathbed that the tower on which the sort of new fangled compost cement and other new materials were beginning to display alarming cracks had been built with no foundations. So it could fall at any time.

Beckford did the decent thing. He owned up to Farquhar. Farquhar was very oblivious about the whole thing and said, it'll outlast my lifetime, no problem. But in fact, not long afterwards, there was a God Almighty crack and the whole of the tower fell down, demolishing all but the coiniest part, the sanctuary and the

oratory which remain today. I've been there and I've looked at as much of the foundations as I can. Now I'm sure, as I said earlier, that the experience of living at Fonthill and then having Beckford's Tower made him even more reclusive. His sort of

and solitary. In later life, he was perceived to be a well mannered, slightly dressed, an odd recluse who caused no offense to anyone. But one of the odder of his wishes was to be buried in a revelation chamber at the top of Beckford's tower. Of course, this

couldn't come about because at the time Beckford's Tower was not consecrated and the graveyard which is now surrounding it didn't exist.

tell you more about it but I'm aware that we've got an awful lot to discuss.

I I would I would just like to add that if if anybody listening has a chance to drive through the Fonthill Estate in Dorset, many of the landscape is still there. but

let's move on to and on to bathing in Bath which is what Bath was famous for. And it turns out it wasn't as rosy as we all kind of imagined it would be.

Right, Right, so this is really image versus reality. Okay, 1799, Jane's wealthy Edward, sorry, let me start again. 1799, Jane's wealthy elder brother Edward was convinced that he was suffering from gout. And so he decided that what he would do is come to Bath and take a cure.

that is, bathe in and drink copious quantities of the naturally occurring hot mineral water. He was accompanied by his wife Elizabeth, their two eldest children, Edward Jr. and

can't remember the name of the other one. Jane and Mrs. Austen joined him as guests. Jane's beloved sister Cassandra, meanwhile being on family duty at Edward's estate in Godmarsham, Kent, looking after Edward's younger children. So what Edward did is he took a house at 13 Queen Square.

which still exists, bottom corner of Queen Square, number 13, on the end of the terrace that also houses the Francis Hotel. And he took that for six weeks where he would have enjoyed the more fashionable, private, aristocratic, serpentine-walled cross Bath. Now, there's a popular story which I've not been fully

able to substantiate. But the cross Bath had separate bathing nights for gentlemen and ladies. And what would happen on those nights is that musicians would serenade those steeping themselves in the pool below.

from a little musician's gallery. Musicians would surround them from the musician's gallery at first floor level surrounding the bath. But there were certain irregularities because on men's nights, on ladies' nights, men were allowed into the public gallery.

to throw into the musicians gallery to throw tokens of regard to the beauty of their choice in the bath below. So that might be a little nose gay, a little popular nose gay with a note tied to it or something similar. The Cross Bath has its origins in a nearby Roman Bath and it was

named after a cross, the Melfort Cross, which was dismantled in 1783, which once occupied the centre of it. It was by Thomas Baldwin, who just beforehand was reordering Bath Street. So Baldwin rebuilt it and then it was reconstructed and reconfigured.

by another architect, John Palmer. All that survives of Baldwin's interior today is an elegant relief of vase and the musicians gallery, sorry to say, has long gone. On 2nd of June, 1799, Jane wrote to her sister, Cassandra, what must I tell you of Edward?

Truth or falsehood? I will try the former and you may choose for yourself another time. He drinks at the Hetling pump, is to bathe tomorrow and try electricity on Tuesday. He proposed the latter himself to Dr. Fellows. Dr. Fellows was Jane's aunt's physician, Mrs. Lee Perrett's physician.

Doctor Fellows who made no objection to it, but I fancy we are all unanimous in expecting no advantage from it. Now the headling pump which is to the left of the cross path is still easily identifiable and Edward probably had his electrical treatment of which we know nothing but on which I can speculate there.

It was, the hot Bath was known during the medieval period, rebuilt by John Wood the Younger, 1775 to 1777. And it retains vestiges of its original floor plan. Central plunge pool with little treatment rooms off on the four corners, if you like, of the pool.

Now Jane commented again on the 11th of June, Edward has been pretty well for this last week and the waters have never disagreed with him in any respect. Now I've been through Jane's letters pretty exhaustively. Her lack of faith in the curative qualities of the mineral water is well known but one thing that comes across when writing of

Edward and his health is that Jane may well have thought him a hypochondriac. He did have a lot of health issues or concerns, although he appeared to be as strong as an ox. And he did have a remarkably long life by the standards of the time. He sired 11 children by his poor wife, Elizabeth.

and died eventually at the age of 85, which was, you know, very old for that period of time. And I think too that Jane was well aware of the glamorous issue of bathing, which is demonstrated many times over at the posher Cross Bath. But she would have also been well aware of the far less select

King's Bath. That's at the rear of the present day Pump Room and was built over the Roman sacred spring. And she would have also known of its sordid aspects, such as naked urchins jumping in from the balconette terraces to retrieve carelessly dropped or perhaps coins discarded for luck. She would have known of the public nature of it.

overlooked by the curious peering out of lodgings house windows. She would have been aware of the fact that there wasn't any shelter from the elements. And she would have been aware that it was overlooked by businesses and lecture rooms. So, you know, she would have known, I think, and I can return to that point a little later on.

Okay, now Tobias Smollett, especially in his novel Humphry Clinker published 1771, Smollett displays a rather shocking pessimistic view of the human race with an apparent belief that life in the luxurious

English 18th century endangered both sense and sobriety. And I think it's worth bearing in mind that he trained as a doctor and served as a surgeon. So some of his serious article comments are professional ones. And when he was concerned, by the way, in which the thermal water was used and regulated.

The fictional ones tend to be general, don't specifically apply to The Cross Bath. But from his essay on the, a serious essay on the external use of water, 1752, this is what he says. Some may be apprehensive, some may be apprehensive of being tainted.

with infectious appearances of the filth, which being washed from the bodies of patients is left sticking to the sides of the place. Diseased people of all ages, sexes and conditions are admitted into an open bath. And this, think, is a King's Bath, which affords little or no shelter from the inclemencies

of the weather. He goes further in Humphry Clinker. I went into the King's Bath by the advice of our friend C.H. in order to clear the strainer of the skin for the benefit of a free perspiration. And the first object that saluted my eye was a child full of scruffulous ulcers carried in the arms of one of the guides.

under the very noses of the bathers. I was so shocked at the sight that I retired immediately with indignation and disgust. Suppose the matter of those ulcers floating on the water comes into contact with my skin when all the pores are open. I would ask you what must be the consequence? Good heaven! The very thought makes my blood run cold.

To purify myself from all such contamination, I went to the Duke of Kingston's private bath, then in Kingston Parade, and there I was almost suffocated for want of free air. The place was so small and the steam so stifling, I am now as much afraid of drinking as of bathing, for after a long conversation with the doctor,

about the construction of the pump and the cistern, it is very far from being clear to me that the patients in the Pump Room don't swallow the scourings of the bathers. I can't help suspecting that there is, or maybe, regurgitation from the bath into the cistern of the pump. In that case, what a delicate beverage.

is every day quaffed by the drinkers, medicated by the sweat and dirt and dandruff and the abominable discharges of various kinds from 20 different bodies, parboiling in the kettle below. Now if you were to ask me if I believe Smollett, I have to say yes I do, wholeheartedly.

curly, like a corkscrew effect between the prongs, put through that in one of the separate rooms while Edward was soaking in the bath. When he came out of the water, he would have been roughly towel dry and his apparel rolled up a little and the tractor rung with great vigor over his skin.

And that was supposed to make him feel extremely invigorated. That brings me on to Mary Shelley, a persistent belief that Frankenstein was written overnight at the Villa Diodati on the shores of Lake Geneva, where she, Shelley, Byron, Byron's pregnant lover Claire Claremont, and the poor, rather fragile physician, Polidori.

were entertaining themselves during a particularly violent thunderstorm. I believe that to be twaddle. The idea, I think, was popularized by the Kenneth Branagh striking film, 1994 Gothic, but emotionally hysterical, and rather more measured and, I think, accurate account, closely tied into archival research.

a single summer with LB. I think it's Derek Farlow, something like that. It makes it clear that Villa Diodati was a place where the idea started. In fact, the idea that the

place that Mary actually wrote Shelley was in number five Abbey Churchyard on the site of the Little Link building connecting the present-day entrance to the Roman baths with the Pump Room. That had a bookshop on the ground floor and above that lodgings rooms and in 1816

Mary Shelley stayed there. Just around the corner in Kingston Parade, which of course before the discovery of the Roman Baths had businesses, dwellings, etc. etc. was the Kingston lecture rooms where a Dr. Wilkinson lectured on his theory that

chemically induced electrical charges could be used to bring inanimate matter to life. And although there is no proof that I found yet, I would love to think that Mary Shelley went there. Okay, number five, Abbey Churchyard demolished. But the sellers...

of the old building, number five, remain. Guess what it houses? An electrical substation. This is true. So quite ironic. I was going to mention briefly the celestial bed. Do we have time for that?

But this is one of the strangest things that was ever invented. Dr. James Graham, taken very seriously at the time, but was, I'm sure, quack, arrived in 1778 and promised cures through effluvia, vapors, applications, ethereal, magnetic, or electric. He promoted

promoted earth bathing in which patients were buried up to the neck in mud and claimed to have developed a cure for impotence in the form of the celestial bed. 50 to 100 pounds to hire for the night. It's unclear quite what the treatment consisted of, although it involved electricity, aromatic oils, magnets.

a large mirror positioned above the Some accounts say that the bed had a tilting frame. Underneath the mirror, and above the mirror was a canopy of fresh flowers occupied by a pair of live turtle doves. And there was an automatic organ emitting what they called wind music, which increased in

intensity to match the order of the bed's occupants. There were also the services of several scantily clad young ladies, one of whom Emma Lyon married Sir William Hamilton and later still, as of course the notorious Emma Hamilton, became

I particularly wanted to mention this, A Vanished Pleasure Garden and Fanny Burney. Now, Fanny Burney, without her father's knowledge, had published her first novel, Evelina Anonymously, January 1778.

Dr. Bernay quickly found out who the real author was and he couldn't resist telling his friends, Mr. and Mrs. Thrall, about his unexpectedly clever daughter. Henry Thrall, wealthy London brewer, and his wife Hester loved to entertain the intelligentsia of the day. Their circle included Samuel Johnson,

who actually seems to have been sadly in love with Mrs. Thrall. Now, as soon as Mrs. Thrall discovered that Fanny was Dr. Burney's daughter, the author of Evelina, wanted to introduce Fanny to her own literary circle. She'd already stayed at the Thrall's London townhouse in Bankside.

at their Streatham Mansion and the house in Brighton and she and Mrs. Thrall anyway had become friends despite their 11 year age difference. 1779 Mr. Thrall had a stroke and the following spring advised to go to Bath to take a cure. So in other words bathe in and drink the water. Fanny was invited to join them and their young daughter

Queenie. Now they alighted at York House, which is now known as the Royal York Hotel and actually houses a travel lodge in George Street, where they were advised of places to lodge and they took a rather beautiful place, number

14 I think it is, number 14 South Parade which is on the corner of South Parade overlooking the river and a short few steps to the ferry leading across to Spring Gardens. Spring Gardens now lost was a popular pleasure garden

opens in the 1730s south side of the river and it occupied much of the area between the Pulteney Bridge and Widcombe so behind Bath Spa railway station as now. And one of the later terraces of houses close to Widcombe retains a spring garden name. The rural setting was destroyed 1788 onwards when the building of

Great Pulteney Street took place. And Tobias Smollett's Mrs. Willis in Humphry Clinker described the gardens as a sweet retreat laid out in walks and parks and parterres of flowers. And there is a long room for breakfasting and dancing.

They were described elsewhere as being a fair Elysium, a rectangular plot with a romantic, less formal layout than Harrison's Walks. There was another garden that one of Mrs. Stralsky particularly wanted to visit, which was Bathwick Villa, Alderman Ferry's house, an eccentric

quirky, fanciful Gothic, Gothic with a K really, private field, mini mansion, salon, very new, built 1777 to 79. It was in Powlett Road, northeast of the Crown Inn today on an extension of the Bathwick Estate. And I can tell you that it was demolished alas.

1897 but some of the quirky animal sculptures that adorned it are on the fronts of some of the houses nearby. Okay, Fanny described their extraordinary visit. The three thralls, the bishop and I, that's the bishop of Peterborough, pursued our scheme, crossed the Avon by ferry, by the little ferry

which was a few steps from the doors of number 14, had a sweet walk through the meadows, drank tea at Spring Gardens, where the bishop did the honors with a spirit, a gaiety, and an activity that jovialized us all. And really, we were prodigiously lively. We then walked on to Mr. Ferry's habitation.

Now that must have taken them at least half an hour. They kept us half an hour in the garden while they were preparing for our reception in the house. Where, after parading through four of five little vulgarly, showy closets, not rooms, we were conducted into a very gaudy little apartment where the master of the house sat reclining on his arm.

to show that the house and its inhabitants were carefully arranged for our reception. The bishop with a gravity of demeanor difficult for him to sustain. So I can imagine the bishop going and trying to stifle his laughter, apologize for our intrusion and return thanks for seeing the house and garden.

Mr Ferry started from his pensive attitude and begged us to be seated. And then a curtain was drawn and we perceived through the glass a perspective view of ships, boats and water. This rare show over the maid who officiated a show one had a hint given her and presently a trap door opened and up jumped a cover table.

augmented with various devices. When we had expressed our delight at this long enough to satisfy Mr. Ferry, another hint was given, and presently dropped an eagle from the ceiling, whose talons were put into a certain hook at the top of the covering of the table. And when the admiration of this was over,

up again flew the eagle, conveying in his talons the cover and leaving under it a riposte of cakes, sweets, oranges and jellies. Now, what happened after that was it seems that the bishop and the thralls, or walked and fanny, all walked back to South Parade and

And yes, they would have caught a ferry, but they would have come back through Spring Gardens. Although they could have gone over the Pulteney Bridge. they were so lost in discussion that Mrs. Thrall was hopelessly late for her own evening dinner party and their guests.

a terrible breach of etiquette. And unfortunately, the two ladies fell out later, especially after Mrs. Thrall married a very much younger man. And Fanny Burney married a French emigre when we were at war with that

and so on. So rather a sad end to the story there, I'm afraid.

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