CLUB (A. S. cleofan, to divide, the club expenses being shared by the members), a company of persons associated for some com mon object —social, literary, political, etc. It has been claimed that social clubs were lcnown to the ancient Romans, but the evidence of their existence is scanty. Inscriptions tell of clubs of Roman citizens in foreign cities and also of military clubs. For several centuries the club has been a peculiar institution in Eng land and of late it has become a prominent feature in American life. It is not easy to de termine at what time clubs originated in Eng land, but Occleve mentions one to which he belonged (during the reign of Henry IV), called 4La Court de Bone Compaignie.4 In 1659 Au brey explained the word 4clubbe as meaning 4a sodality in a taverne.4 He adds, ((Here we had a balloting-box and balloted how things should be earned.) The earliest London club of any celebrity was established about the be ginning of the 17th century, at the Mermaid Tavern, Friday street (otherwise known as Bread street). Among its members were Shakespeare, Sir Walter Raleigh (the founder), Beaumont, Fletcher, Donne and Selden. Ben Jonson figured at another club, which met at the Devil Tavern, near Temple Bar. It ap pears certain that clubs existed alongside of coffee-houses in the 17th and 18th centuries. At that time, however, their character was very different from what it is now. The coffee houses of those days were the nearest repre sentatives of the modern clubs, while the clubs were commonly nothing but a kind of restau rants or taverns where people resorted to take their meals. There was one feature, however, which was peculiar to clubs from the first, and distinguished them from coffee-houses ; namely, that, while anybody was free to enter a coffee house, it was absolutely necessary that a person should have been formally received as a mem ber of a club, according to its regulations, be fore he was at liberty to enter it. Almack's, Brooks' and White's were among the best known coffee-houses. Among the earliest of the London clubs was the Kit-Cat Club, formed in the reign of Queen Anne. Among its 40 mem bers, who used to meet at the shop of a pas try-cook (Christopher Cat or Katt), in order to do justice to certain mutton pies for which he was famous, were six dulces, among them the Duke of Marlborough; five earls; many of the most distinguished leaders of the Whig PartY, such as Sunderland, Halifax, Sir Robert VValpole and others; and several of the leading authors of the day, among them, Vanbrugh, Congreve, Addison and Steele. The last two
owed to the club idea the form given to the Spectator. Another club formed about the same time was the Beefsteak Club. Originally these two clubs had no pronounced political views, but in the end they began to occupy themselves with politics, the ICit-Cat Club be ing Whig and the Beefsteak Club, Tory. There have been several Beefsteak clubs since. Dur ing the last century it was common to. give ec centric names to clubs and the condiuons of being admitted to membership in any one of these clubs were as a rule equally remarkable. Among these may be mentioned the Surly Club,• the Split-farthing Club; the Ugly Club (of which Wilkes was elected president for life, and Mirabeau was an honorary member); the Unfortunate Club; the Lying Club, the mem bers of which were not permitted to utter a single truth during their sittings, unless they had been expressly authorized to do so by the president. Perhaps the most celebrated club of the 18th century was that which was first called The Club,' but which was afterward known as the Literary Club. It was founded in 1764 and numbered among its members Dr. Johnson, who was for a long time its president, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Edmund Burke, Oliver Goldsmith, Edward Gibbon and other distin guished men. In 1864 the 100th anniversary of its foundation was celebrated. In the rules which Dr. Johnson wrote for another club, the Apollo, he coined the still-serviceable word, "clubbable." In 1800 there were only half a dozen clubs existing in London and within a century there were 100, with a total member ship of 80,000. The most important London political clubs of the present day are the Carl ton Club, founded by the Duke of Wellington, and the Reform Club. The former is the prin cipal club belonging to the Conservative party in the kingdom and the building in which its members meet, which is the most palatial edi fice of the kind in the kingdom, may be re garded as the headquarters of the Conservative party. This club was founded in 1832 (2,000 members). The Reform Club, the building be longing to which stands next to that of the Carlton Club, was long the great club of the Liberal party, founded in 1837. Among the other important London clubs are the National Liberal, Constitutional, United Service, Athe nieum, Army and Navy, Travelers, Garrick, Primrose, etc. Similar clubs were started in the chief cities of England and in the colonies.