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member of the Club in 1764; took an early liking to J.B. and aided his election to the Club; regarded by S.J. as the Club’s expert on polite literature; amassed collection of over 30, 000 volumes: 56, 133 n. a, 135–6, 191 andn. a, 197, 198, 201, 228, 251, 256, 278, 280, 309, 322,382, 385, 392, 398,412, 418,423, 429,433, 436,439, 446,447, 453, 455, 463, 470, 479, 491, 522, 526 n. b, 528, 531, 535, 575, 627, 628–9, 636–7, 675, 713, 714, 715, 730, 731, 732, 733, 749, 751 and n. a, 753, 767, 768, 772, 775 n. a, 777, 806, 816, 818, 821, 825, 864, 872

Beauclerk, Lady Sidney (d. 1766), Topham Beauclerk’s mother: 751

Beaufort, Elizabeth (Boscawen), Duchess of (1747–1828): 753

Beaumont (Francis c. 1584–1616) and Fletcher (John, 1579–1625): 442, 514

Becket, Thomas (fl. 1760–75), bookseller and publisher: 420

Beckford, William (1709–70), planter and politician; Alderman and Lord Mayor of London; one of the Jamaican Beckfords; leader of an influential group of MPs who were absentee proprietors from the West Indies; described by Horace Walpole as a ‘noisy, good humoured flatterer’: 560, 632

Bedford, Hilkiah (1663–1724), bishop of the Nonjuring Church of England; achieved fame through The Hereditary Right of the Crown of England Asserted (1713), a work he did not write although for which he was arrested: 922

Bedford, John Russell, 4th Duke of (1710–71), Whig politician; capable orator and strong leader of the Bedford group; variously lord of the Admiralty, Secretary of State for the South and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland: 938

Bedford, Francis Russell Bedford, 5th Duke of (1765–1802), agriculturalist and politician; first president of the Smithfield Club (1798); the Foxites’ leading speaker in the Upper House; most famous intervention was in scathing criticism of Burke: 677, 833

Behmen, or Bohme, Jacob (1575–1624), German mystic: 325

Belchier, John (1706–85), surgeon to Guy’s Hospital; fellow of the Royal Society (1732); sometime contributor to Philosophical Transactions: 547

Bell, Dr William (1731–1816), prebendary of Westminster: 369 n. a

Bell, John (1691–1780), diplomatist and traveller; author of Travels from St Petersburg in Russia to Various Parts of Asia (1763): 291

Bell, John, brother of Dr William Bell: 369 n. a

Bell, Mrs John (c.1710–71), wife of the above: 369 n. a

Bell, John (1745–1831), bookseller; ran the British Library from 1769; acting as agent for the Martin brothers, published The Poets of Great Britain (1777–82); credited with having introduced the ‘modern’ face in English printing; described by Charles Knight as the ‘puck of booksellers’: 579

Bell, Revd Robert (1702–81), minister of Strathaven: 718

Bellamy, (Mrs) George Anne (1731?-88), actress; played Juliet to Garrick’s Romeo in 1750 season at Drury Lane; took title role in Robert Dodsley’s Cleone at Covent Garden (1758), earning attention for an unconventionally simple and quiet performance: 175, 897 n. a

Belsham, William (1752–1827), Whig political writer, Dissenter and historian; author of Essays, Philosophical, Historical and Literary (1789); in later life produced A History of Great Britain from 1688 to 1820: 206 n. b

Bennet, James, of Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire: 15, 245

Bensley, Robert (1738?–1817?), actor discovered by Garrick; most successful role as Malvolio in Twelfth Night, praised by Charles Lambas ‘magnificent’: 287

Benson, Revd George (1699–1762), Nonconformist: 617 n.a

Bentham, Dr Edward (1707–76), university professor; moderate and orthodox canon of first prebend at Christchurch, Oxford (1754); regius professor of divinity at Oxford (1763); anonymously attacked Burke for his criticism of the university’s loyalty during the American crisis; author of Reflections on the Study of Divinity (1771) and Reflections upon the Nature and Usefulness of Logick (1740): 502, 617 n. a

Bentley, Richard (1662–1742), philologist and classical scholar; Master of Trinity College, Cambridge; staunch Hanoverian; edited Paradise Lost (1732), a virtual rewriting with over 800 emendations in the margin; in Dissertation upon the Epistles of Phalaris (1697),