[ The Soakers' Club, a 'convivial club' in Covent Garden. ] Club rules and 'Promoter's Address' by Julian Sharman, printed by the Chiswick Press.

Author: 
Julian Sharman, 'Promoter' of the Soakers' Club, Covent Garden, London [ The Chiswick Press, London ]
Publication details: 
'Printed at the Chiswick Press' [ Chiswick Press: - Printed by Whittingham and Wilkins, Tooks Court, Chancery Lane ]. 1874. [ Sharman's address dated from 'Covent Garden, | May, 1874.'
£50.00
SKU: 18538

[1] + 13pp., 12mo. Stitched. In fair condition, lightly aged and worn. A tasteful production in grey printed wraps. Elaborate pseudo-seventeenth-century design to title-page replicated on front cover. Five-page 'Promoter's Address'' to 'My Friend and Pitcher', signed in type by Sharman, followed by a page listing the five members of the 'Committee, 1874-5' (Julian Sharman; Henry S. Leigh; Bourchier F. Hawksley; Jas. J. Railston; F. W. Robinson), and five pages carrying the club's fourteen rules. According to the rules, the 'material objects of the Club' are 'the absorption of liquors, and the promotion of sound and curious feeding'. In his introduction Sharman refers to the memories with which 'This old PIazza' (i.e. Covent Garden) 'teems': 'In the taps and bagnios around have congregated men of letters and of town, gentlemen of the robe, and the frailer virgins of the playhouse. These are the societies we undoubtedly follow, the coteries we may, or may not, emulate. We may be as chivalrous as Bayard and more naughty; we may be as abandoned as Bohemia and more good.' Scarce: the only copy traced on OCLC WorldCat or on COPAC at the British Library.