Chapter 4

"_Poor_ Mr. ----, only think of him, _poor_ fellow! How very odd! I believe he was not in joke. He told me a distant connection of his, of another name, whom he never knew till after he heard that the thing happened, who had been transported to New South Wales a matter of sixteen years ago, is to be hanged to-morrow, by way of a secondary punishment, for coming back from transportation."

The audience were profuse in their repetition of the epithet--generous to excess in the free gift of it to Mr. ----. They did not happen to consider it applicable to him who, for an unlawful love of native country, was to undergo a violent and disgraceful death.

This, to be sure, might be attributed to the feeling that so many good regular people have, that it is highly blameable to pity any man who suffers capitally for a breach of the law; that it would be, in some sort, to question the justice of the laws themselves. And the ten or a dozen honest souls that formed the company were probably so good themselves as to be justly scandalized at the notion of holding so much communion with guilt, as to sympathize with it in its sufferings. But I believe, after all, it was rather a flow of idiom than an effort of principle.

Mr. Small, a farmer, well to do in ----shire, fell ill of an acute and dangerous disorder. (By the by, every one was anxious to know if "poor" Mrs. Small's husband was better.) He died,--Mrs. Small was, of course, in decent affliction. But the word of pity was always transferred from the principal sufferer to her, till he was beyond suffering. Then first it was bestowed on the "poor" corpse, which every one came to visit, and flattered as looking "pleasant."

Mrs. Small herself, in the first letter of her widowhood, addressed to an intimate female friend, did not make a more judicious application of the favourite epithet. To this friend it was her habit to write once a quarter. We insert three passages; one extracted from each of these quarterly epistles, which followed in due succession after her sad bereavement:--

"Dear Nelly,--My brother-in-law has given the direction of the funeral to a good economical undertaker, by name Peebles. I have not seen him, and am not like; for he is in too large a way to attend himself, and he sends his man for orders, and to see all done handsome, but cheap.

"_Poor_ Mr. Peebles's man came here last night, and the funeral will be to-morrow. I am in much trouble, as might be expected. My _poor_ new black bonnet is not come home, and keeps me fretting; but _poor_ Peebles's man says I shan't be disappointed, even if he has to go for it himself. _Poor_ Peebles's man! he is up early and down late, to see all right. He was in my room this morning before I was out of bed, that all might be decent, &c. &c. &c. Yours to command, dear Nelly, MARY SMALL."

"Dear Nelly,--It is now three months and better since that _poor_ coffin was put under ground, and I declare I feel quite queer and lonesome without it. But business goes on quite well and brisk. _Poor kind_ Peebles's man! he is off and on; almost always about the house, doing some kind job or other. He is a very decent body; but, I don't know how it is, I'm not to say comfortable. There's a sad noise with my sister's family. You know I never _could_ bear children. My late husband, that's gone, was the only one of the family that could. I am sure I don't know what I could do without _poor dear_ Peebles's man. Yours to command, dear Nelly, MARY SMALL.

"Dear Nelly,--_Poor dear kind_ Peebles's man has never left here; he's my right hand, and he is a very decent body indeed. It is now six _good_ months since that _poor_ funeral took place. I find I am not fit to live alone: I was married this morning to _poor_ Peebles's man. Your sincere friend, dear Nelly, MARY MERRIMATE.

"P.S. Excuse my change of name."

* * * * *

THE GATHERER.

_Electioneering._--In 1749, during the great contested election for Westminster, when Lord Trentham and Sir George Vandeput were candidates, Dr. Barrowby greatly interested himself in favour of the latter, who was put up to oppose the Court party. The doctor had for some weeks attended the noted Joe Weatherby, landlord of the Ben Jonson's Head, in Russell-street, who had become emaciated by a nervous fever. During Dr. Barrowby's visits, the patient's wife, not knowing the doctor's political attachment, had frequently expressed her uneasiness that her dear Joey could not get up, and vote for _her_ good friend Lord Trentham. Towards the end of the election, when very uncommon means were used on both sides to obtain the suffrages of the people, the doctor, calling one morning on his patient, to his great astonishment, found him up and almost dressed.--"Hey-dey! what's the cause of this?" exclaimed Barrowby. "Dear Doctor," said poor Joe, in broken accents, "I am going to poll."--"To poll!" replied the doctor, with much warmth, supposing him of the same opinion with his wife, "going to the d--l, you mean!--why, do you know the cold air may kill you. Get to bed, get to bed, man, as fast as you can, or immediate death may ensue!"--"Oh! if that is the case, sir," returned the patient in a feeble voice, "to be sure I must act as you advise me; but I love my country, sir, and thought, while my wife was out, to seize this opportunity to go to Covent-garden church, and vote for Sir G. Vandeput."--"How, Joe! for Sir George?"--"Yes, sir, I wish him heartily well."--"Do you?" said the medical politician. "Hold, nurse! don't pull off his stockings again; let me feel his pulse. Hey! very well--a good, firm stroke--Egad! this will do. You took the pills I ordered last night?"--"Yes, doctor, but they made me very sick."--"Ay, so much the better. How did your master sleep, nurse?"--"O charmingly, sir."--"Did he! Well, if his mind is really uneasy about this election, he must be indulged; diseases of the mind greatly affect those of the body. Come, come, throw a great coat or blanket about him. It is a fine day; but the sooner he goes the better--the sun will be down early. Here, here, lift him up; a ride will do him good; he shall go with me to the hustings in my chariot." The doctor was directly obeyed; and poor Joe Weatherby was conveyed in the carriage to the hustings, where he gave his vote according to his conscience, amidst the acclamations of the people; and two hours after his politico-medical adviser had left him at his own house, Joe departed this life, loaded with the reproaches of his beloved wife, and her friends of the Court party.

SWAINE.

* * * * *

_A Warning to Critics._--Zoilus, the critic, was called the rhetorical dog: rhetorical, as his style was elegant, and dog, from his practice of snarling.--Vitruvius tells us, that when he visited Alexandria, he recited his writings against the _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_ of Homer to King Ptolemy, which gave the king such offence, that he would take no notice of him; and afterwards, when, urged by indigence, he solicited charity, Ptolemy pulsed him with this contemptuous reflection, that if Homer, who had been dead one thousand years, could by his works give maintenance to many thousand people, a writer so much his superior might surely maintain himself.

P.T.W.

* * * * *

Some years since, an eccentric gentleman built himself a villa upon the brow of one of the loftiest of the Surrey hills, to avoid annoyance from the curious; but the odd situation of his residence drew scores of visiters. This reminds us of some lines by Cowley--

I should have then this only fear, Lest men, when they my pleasures see, Should hither throng to live like me, And so make a city here.

* * * * *

_Imperial Ignorance._--Alexius Comnenus, Emperor of Constantinople, was an arrant dunce: Fuller says, "he hated a booke more than a monster did a looking-glasse; and when his tutor endeavoured to play him into scholarship, by presenting pleasant authors unto him, he returned, that learning was beneath the greatnesse of a prince, who, if wanting it, might borrow it from his subjects, being better stor'd; _for_ (saith hee) _if they will not lend me their braines, I'll take away their heads!_"

* * * * *

_Party Spirit._--Fuller did not think party madness; for, he says such men as will side with neither party "hope, though the great vessel of the state be wrecked, in a private fly-boat of neutrality, to waft their own private adventure safe to the shore. But who ever saw dancers on ropes so equally poise themselves, that at last they fall not down and break their necks?"

* * * * *

_A Court Jester._--Fuller thus describes one: "Of this fellow, his body, downwards, was a fool, his head a knave, who did carefully note, and cunningly vent, by the privileges of his coat, many state-passages, uttering them, in a _wary twilight_, betwixt sport and earnest."

* * * * *

_An Excellent Courtier._--Sir Walter Raleigh speaks of Queen Elizabeth, when sixty years of age, "riding like Alexander, hunting like Diana, walking like Venus, the gentle wind blowing her fair hair about her pure cheeks like a nymph,--sometime sitting in the shade like a goddess, sometime singing like an angell, sometime playing like Orpheus."

* * * * *

_A Lock-et._--Mark Scaliot, blacksmith, in the 20th of Queen Elizabeth, made a lock of eleven pieces of iron, steel, and brass, with a pipe key, and golden chain of forty-three links, which were hung round the neck of a flea.--The animal, together with this burthen, weighed only one grain and a half.

* * * * *

_Oil._--Both rape-oil and olive-oil were used in ancient cookery, as appears from the provision bought for Archbishop Warham's dinner.

* * * * *

_Printed and published by J. LIMBIRD, 143, Strand, (near Somerset House) London; sold by G.G. BENNIS, 55, Rue Neuve, St. Augustin, Paris; CHARLES JUGEL, Francfort; and by all Newsmen and Booksellers._

* * * * *