Chapter 4

As a mere untravelled practical Englishman, and, moreover, of the old school, Quin, no doubt, ranks high in the lists of gastronomy: but he is completely distanced by many moderns, both in love for and knowledge of the science. Among the most noted of the moderns we beg to introduce our readers to Mr. Rogerson, an enthusiast and a martyr. He, as may be presumed, was educated at that University where the rudiments of palatic science are the most thoroughly impressed on the ductile organs of youth. His father, a gentleman of Gloucestershire, sent him abroad to make the grand tour, upon which journey, says our informant, young Rogerson attended to nothing but the various modes of cookery, and methods of eating and drinking luxuriously. Before his return his father died, and he entered into the possession of a very large monied fortune, and a small landed estate. He was now able to look over his notes of epicurism, and to discover where the most exquisite dishes were to be had, and the best cooks procured. He had no other servants in his house than men cooks; his butler, footman, housekeeper, coachman, and grooms, were all cooks. He had three Italian cooks, one from Florence, another from Sienna, and a third from Viterbo, for dressing one dish, the _docce piccante_ of Florence. He had a messenger constantly on the road between Brittany and London, to bring him the eggs of a certain sort of plover, found near St. Maloes. He has eaten a single dinner at the expense of fifty-eight pounds, though himself only sat down to it, and there were but two dishes. He counted the minutes between meals, and seemed totally absorbed in the idea, or in the action of eating, yet his stomach was very small; it was the exquisite flavour alone, that he sought. In nine years he found his table dreadfully abridged by the ruin of his fortune; and himself hastening to poverty. This made him melancholy, and brought on disease. When totally ruined, having spent near 150,000 l., a friend gave him a guinea to keep him from starving; and he was found in a garret soon after roasting an ortolan with his own hands. We regret to add, that a few days afterwards, this extraordinary youth shot himself. We hope that his notes are not lost to the dining world.

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COLLEGE DREAMS.

How often in senior common-rooms may be marked the gradual dropping asleep of the learned and venerable members! First, after a few rounds of the bottle, the tongues, which are tired of eulogizing or vituperating the various dishes which had smoked upon the board, gradually begin to be still,--soon conversation comes absolutely to a stand,--the candles grow alarmingly long in the wick,--comparative darkness involves the sage assembly,--and first one, then another, drops off into a placid and harmonious repose. Then what dreams float before the eyes of their imagination! Blue silk pelisses jostling shovel hats, church spires dancing in most admired disorder, fat incumbents falling down in a fit, neat clerical-looking gigs standing at vicarage doors, and these all incongruously commingled with white veils, lawn sleeves, roast beef, pulpit cushions, bright eyes, and small black sarsnet shoes. Suddenly the chapel bell dissolves the fleeting fabric of the vision; and, behold! the white veil is a poet's imagination, the church spire is still at a miserable distance, the vicarage is a Utopian nonentity, and the fat incumbent, in a state of the ruddiest health, is the only reality of the dream.

_--Blackwood's Magazine._

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WOMAN

Nothing sets so wide a mark "between the vulgar and the noble seed" as the respect and reverential love of womanhood. A man who is always sneering at woman is generally a coarse profligate, or a coarse bigot, no matter which.

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ANGLING.

We have often thought that angling alone offers to man the degree of half-business, half-idleness, which the fair sex find in their needle-work or knitting, which, employing the hands, leaves the mind at liberty, and occupying the attention so far as is necessary to remove the painful sense of a vacuity, yet yields room for contemplation, whether upon things heavenly or earthly, cheerful or melancholy. --_Quarterly Rev._

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THE GATHERER.

"A snapper-up of unconsidered trifles." SHAKSPEARE.

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LAUGHTER.

"Laugh and grow fat," is an old adage; and Sterne tells us, that every time a man laughs, he adds something to his life. An eccentric philosopher, of the last century, used to say, that he liked not only to laugh himself, but to see laughter, and hear laughter. "Laughter, Sir, laughter is good for health; it is a provocative to the appetite, and a friend to digestion. Dr. Sydenham, Sir, said the arrival of a merry-andrew in a town was more beneficial to the health of the inhabitants than twenty asses loaded with medicine." Mr. Pott used to say that he never saw the "Tailor riding to Brentford," without feeling better for a week afterwards.

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LEGAL PEARL-DIVERS.

Every barrister can "shake his head," and too often, like Sheridan's Lord Burleigh, it is the only proof he vouchsafes of his wisdom. Curran used to call these fellows "legal pearl-divers."--"You may observe them," he would say, "their heads barely under water--their eyes shut, and an index floating behind them, displaying the precise degree of their purity and their depth."

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GRAMMATICAL LEARNING.

An author left a comedy with Foote for perusal; and on the next visit asked for his judgment on it, with rather an ignorant degree of assurance. "If you looked a little more to the grammar of it, I think," said Foote, "it would be better."--"To the grammar of it, Sir! What! would you send me to school again?"--"And pray, Sir," replied Foote, very gravely, "would that do you any harm?"

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SWEARING BY PROXY.

Cardinal Dubois used frequently, in searching after any thing he wanted, to swear excessively. One of his clerks told him, "Your eminence had better hire a man to swear for you, and then you will gain so much time."

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THE MUNIFICENT SAINT.

A devout lady offered up a prayer to St. Ignatius for the conversion of her husband; a few days after, the man died; "What a good saint is our Ignatius!" exclaimed the consolable widow, "he bestows on us more benefits than we ask for!"

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PRODIGALITY.

A petty journalist was boasting in company, that he was a dispenser of fame to those on whom he wrote. "Yes, Sir," replied an individual present, "you dispense it so liberally, that you leave none for yourself."

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PHYSIOGNOMISTS.

Pickpockets and beggars are the best practical physiognomists, without having read a line of Lavater, who, it is notorious, mistook a highwayman for a philosopher, and a philosopher for a highwayman.

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EPITAPH

In the Broadway churchyard, Westminster, on three children, who all died very early, the eldest being little more than three years of age:--

Three children, not dead, but sleeping lies, With Christ they live above the skies, Wash'd in his blood, and for his dress, Christ's glorious robe of righteousness, In which they shine more bright by far Than sun, or moon, or morning star; In Paradise they wing their way, Blooming in one eternal day.

G.W.N.

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