After Brummell’s day was over, Lord Alvanley (a coloured print of whom as “The Man from White’s” still hangs in the club) became the chief of the bow-window party. Most of this nobleman’s time seems to have been spent in endeavouring to get rid of a large fortune, the inheritance of which had caused him to leave the Coldstream Guards, in which he had served with distinction in the Peninsular War. Lord Alvanley was the most noted bon-vivant of his day, and was utterly regardless of what his dinners cost. One of his fancies was to have a cold apricot tart on his sideboard every day throughout the year. Another instance of his prodigality was the payment of 200 guineas to Gunter for a luncheon-basket, which by an oversight had been forgotten in arranging a day’s boating on the Thames—a costly picnic indeed! On one occasion Lord Alvanley organized a dinner at White’s, at which it was agreed that whoever could produce the most expensive dish should dine for nothing. The winner was the organizer, whose dish was a fricassée composed entirely of the _noix_, or small pieces at each side of the back, taken from thirteen kinds of birds, among them being one hundred snipe, forty woodcocks, twenty pheasants, and so on, the total amounting to about three hundred birds. The cost of the ridiculous dish amounted to £108 5s. This extravagant and eccentric peer, who, it was said, never paid cash for anything, was once asked by the sarcastic Colonel Armstrong, who knew of this failing, what he had given for a fine horse he was riding. “Nothing,” said his lordship; “I owe Milton 200 guineas for him.” Another failing of Lord Alvanley’s caused his friends at country-houses some anxiety. He always read in bed, and would never blow out his candle, his method of extinguishing that light being usually to fling it into the middle of the room; if this was ineffectual, he would throw a pillow at it. Sometimes he would vary the proceedings by putting the burning candle bodily under his bolster. Another frequenter of the bow-window was Lord Allen, who became such a confirmed lover of London that, during the latter part of his life, it was said his only walk was from White’s to Crockford’s, over the way and back again. It was also said that he was so accustomed to the roar of the London traffic, that to get him to sleep at Dover, where he was visiting Lord Alvanley, that nobleman hired a hackney coach to drive in front of his window at the inn all night, and sent out the boots at proper intervals to call the time and the weather, like the London watchmen. Lord Allen was a man of very moderate means, and eked out his income by dining out as much as possible. An incivil remark at dinner to an old lady caused her to say: “My lord, your title must be as good as board wages to you!”