with the greatest familiarity, reposes himself on a couch, and fancies himself at home. The master of the house at last comes in, Menalcas rises to receive him, and desires him to sit down; he talks, muses, and then talks again. The gentleman of the house is tired and amazed; Menalcas is no less so, but is every moment in hopes that his impertinent guest will at last end his tedious visit, Night comes on, when Menalcas is hardly undeceived. 66 When he is playing at backgammon, he calls for a full glass of wine and water; it is his turn to throw; he has the box in one hand, and his glass in the other, and being extremely dry, and unwilling to lose time, he swallows down both the dice, and at the same time throws his wine into the tables. He writes a letter and flings the sand into the ink-bottle; he writes a second, and mistakes the superscription; a nobleman receives one of them, and upon opening it reads as follows: "I would have you, honest Jack, immediately upon the receipt of this, take in hay enough to serve me the winter." His farmer receives the other, and is amazed to see in it, My Lord, I received your Grace's commands with an entire submission to-" If he is at an entertainment, you may see the pieces of bread continually multiplying round his plate; it is true the rest of the company want it, as well as their knives and forks, which Menalcas does not let them keep long. Sometimes in a morning he puts his whole family in a hurry, and at last goes out without being able to stay for his coach or dinner, and for that day you may see him in every part of the town, except the very place where he had appointed to be upon a business of importance. You would often take him for every thing that he is not; for a fellow quite stupid, for he hears nothing for a fool, for he talks to himself, and has a hundred grimaces and motions with his head, which are altogether involuntary; for a proud man, for he looks full upon you, and takes no notice of your saluting him; the truth of it is, his eyes are open, but he makes no use of them, and neither sees you, nor any man, nor any thing else; he came once from his country-house, and his own footmen undertook to rob him, and su ceeded; they held a flambeau to his throat, and bad him deliver his purse; he did so, and comiuz home told his friends he had been robbed; they desired to know the particulars, "Ask my ser vants," said Menalcas, " for they were with me." BRUYERE, THE SUITOR. Lucas, with ragged coat, attends A HARD MASTER. A theatrical manager, one evening when band was playing an overture, went up to horn players, and asked why they were not pl ing. They said they had twenty bars re Rest!" says he, "I'll have no rest in my es pany; I pay you for playing not for resting." APPROPRIATE PRESENTS. On the City of London presenting Ado Keppel with the freedom in a box of heart of and Lord Rodney in a gold box: Each admiral's defective part, The wealthy Keppel wanted heart z THE LAUGHING PHILOSOPHER. THE COMPOSITION OF WINE. An Asiatic chief being asked his opinion of a pipe of Madeira wine, presented to him by an officer of the company's service, said," he thought Wa juice extracted from women's tongues, and Hon's hearts; for after he had drunk enough of it, be could talk for ever, and fight the devil.' BOX-LOBBY LOUNGERS. On hearing two worthless cowards challenge each other in Drury-lane theatre, a gentleman present wrote the following stanzas: In Drury's lobby, Tom and Dick fore them. Lady Dainty is convinced, that it is necessary for a gentlewoman to be out of order; and to preserve that character, she dines every day in her closet at twelve, that she may become her table at two, and be unable to eat in public. About five years ago, I remember it was the fashion to be short-sighted. A man would not own an acquaintance until he had first examined him with his glass. At a lady's entrance into the playhouse, you might see tubes immediately levelled at her from every quarter of the pit and side-boxes. However, that mode of infirmity is out, and the age has recovered its sight; but the blind seem to be succeeded by the lame, and a janty limp is the present beauty. I think I have formerly observed, a cane is part of the dress of a prig, and always worn upon a button, for fear he should be thought to have an occasion for it, or be esteemed really, and not genteelly a cripple. I have considered but could never find out the bottom of this vanity. I indeed have heard of a Gascon general, who, by the lucky grazing of a bullet on the roll of his stocking, took occasion to halt all his life after. But as for our peaceable cripples, I know no foundation for their beha viour, without it may be supposed that in this warlike age, some think a cane the next honour to a wooden leg. This sort of affectation I have known run from one limb or member to another. Before the Limpers came in, I remember a race of Lispers, fine persons, who took an aversion to particular letters in our language; some never uttered the letter H; and others had as mortal an As bad as the world is, I find by very strict ob- aversion to S. Others have had their fashionable aviation upon virtue and vice, that if men ap-defect in their ears, and would make you repeat "I am a gentleman!” cried Dick, Now if this palsied pair should meet, AFFECTATION. red no worse than they really are, I should eless work than at present I am obliged to dertake for their reformation. They have geally taken up a kind of inverted ambition, Gect even faults and imperfections of which are innocent. The first of this order of men the Valetudinarians, who are never in health; complain of want of stomach or rest every day til now, and then devour all which comes be I know an ancient all you said twice over. friend of mine, whose table is every day surrounded with flatterers, that makes use of this, sometimes as a piece of grandeur, and at others as an art, to make them repeat their commendations. Such affectations have been indeed in the world in ancient times; but they fell into them out of politic ends. Alexander the Great had a wry neck, which made it the fashion in his court EXEMPLARY LIBERALITY THE SINGLE-SPEECH PARROT. Marshal Villars, upon the death of the Duke de There is an eastern story of a person who taught his parrot to repeat only the words, "What doubt Vendôme, in the reign of Louis the XIVth, was is there of that?" He carried it to the market made Governor of Provence in his room; and for sale, fixing the price at 100 rupees. A mogul when he went to take possession of his new goasked the parrot, "Are you worth 100 rupees?"vernment, the deputies of the province made him The parrot answered, "What doubt is there of the usual present of a purse full of louis d'ors, bot that?" The mogul was delighted, and bought the person who had the honour to present it, said the bird. He soon found out that this was all it to him, "Here, my lord, is such another purse as could say. Ashamed now of his bargain, he said that we gave to the Duke de Vendôme, when, to himself, "I was a fool to buy this bird." The like you, he came to be our governor; but the parrot exclaimed as usual," What doubt is there prince, after accepting of it as a testimony of our regard, very generously returned it."" Ab." of that?" said Marshal Villars, putting the purse into hit pocket, M. Vendôme was a most surprising man; he has not left his fellow behind." THE ONLY CONQUEST. IRISH DREAMING. A facetious abbé, having engaged a box at the Opera-house, at Paris, was turned out of his possession by a mareschal, as remarkable for his un- An English officer being quartered in a sma gentlemanlike behaviour, as for his cowardice and town in Ireland, he and his lady were regulari meanness. The abbé, for this unjustifiable breach besieged as they got into their carriage, by an ol of good-manners, brought his action in a court of beggar-woman, who kept her post at the door, honour, and solicited permission to be his own sailing them daily with fresh importunities. The advocate, which was granted. When the day of charity and patience became exhausted; not trial arrived, he pleaded to the following effect: the petitioner's perseverance. One morning, o "Tis not of Monsieur Suffrein, who acted so oratrix began" Oh, my lady! success to yo nobly in the East Indies-it is not of the Duke de ladyship, and success to your honour's hou Crebillon, who took Minorca-it is not of the this morning, of all the days in the year; for si Comte de Grasse, who so bravely fought Lord did I not dream last night that her ladyship g Rodney, that I complain; but it is of Mareschal me a pound of tea, and your honour gave who took my box at the opera-house, and pound of tobacco."-" But, my good woma never took any thing else." This stroke of satire said the general, "don't you know that drê so sensibly convinced the court, that he had al- go by the rule of contrary ?”—“ Do they so 7" ready inflicted sufficient punishment, that they re-joined the old woman," then it must maan, fused to grant him a verdict. your honour will give me the tea, and her ship the tobacco." EPITAPH ON CAPTAIN JAMES. Tread softly, mortals, o'er the bones He swore all's true, yet here he lies. A GREAT COMPOSER. Dormouse esteems it wond'rous odd, As if he was a very proser. The merit of a rare composer. A GOOD CHARACTER. * A MIRACLE ENHANCED. A painter intending to describe the miracle of Lord Mansfield had discharged a coachman the fishes listening to the preaching of St. Authony whom he suspected of having embezzled his corn; of Padua, painted the lobsters stretching out of the a short time afterwards he received a letter from a water red having probably never seen them in merchant in the city, requesting a character of their native state. Being questioned on this, and the dismissed servant: his lordship accordingly ated how he could justify his representing the wrote an answer, that he was a very sober lobsters as boited, he extricated himself by observ-man, and an excellent coachman, hut that he being, "that the miracle was the greater." THE STAGE-COACH. Besolv'd to visit a far distant friend, porter to the Bull-and-gate, I send, lad bid the slave at all events engage me place or other in the Chester stage; to at three, and swears he cannot stay; I ning, stretch out my arms, half clos'd my eyes, in like mode, jamm'd in on t'other side a fair, and in whose lap a boyplague eternal, and her only joy: the glorious number to complete, Go my landlord for that bodkin seat; d by ev'ry hillock, rut, and stone, ne screams, and has a thousand fears; lieved he had cheated him. Some time after this, going to Caen-wood, his lordship met his old coachman, who accosted him, expressing himself glad to see him in such good health, and thanked him for the character he had given him, in consequence of which he had got an excellent place."Your lordship," he said, "has been pleased to say I was a sober man, and a good coachman, but that you believed I had cheated you; my master observed, that if I answered the two first descriptions, the last he thought little of, for he did not think the devil himself could cheat your lordship." SCARCE ARTICLES IN A REPUBLIC. were George the First of England having frequently experienced the rapacity of the Dutch at Helvoetsluys, was, in one of his journeys, determined to avoid it by not stopping there. It was a fine summer's day; and while the servants changing the horses, and stowing his baggage in the coach, he stopped at the door of the principal inn, and asked for three fresh eggs; which having eaten, he enquired what he had to pay for them. Two hundred florins," was the reply. "How!" cried the astonished monarch," why so? eggs are not scarce at Helvoetsluys.' ."—" No,” replied the landlord, "but kings are." TO A PARISH-CLERK. Sternhold and Hopkins had great qualms, To make the heart full glad; PROOFS OF INSANITY. In a cause respecting a will, evidence was given to prove the testatrix (an apothecary's wife) a lunatic; and, amongst many other things, it was deposed that she had swept a quantity of pots, phials, lotions, potions, &c. into the streets, as rubbish. "I doubt," said the learned judge, "whether sweeping physic into the street be any proof of insanity."-" True, my lord," replied the counsel; but sweeping the pots away certainly was." LORD THURLOW'S RELIGION. Mr. Tierney once observed of Lord Thurlow, who was much given to swearing and parsimony, that he was a rigid disciplinarian in his religion, for that in his house it was passion-week in the parlour, and lent in the kitchen, all the year round. FIREWORKS. An eminent director of fireworks being in company with some ladies, was highly cominending the epitaph in the abbey on Mr. Purcell's moņu ment “He is gone to that place where only his own Harmony can be exceeded." "Lord, sir," said one of the ladies," the same epitaph might serve for you, by altering a single word "He is gone to that place where only his own Fire-works can be exceeded." SLOTH THE CAUSE OF ENNUI. By action 'tis we life enjoy; In idleness we're dead; VOLTAIRE. RIGID ECONOMY. The steward of the Duke of Gaise representing to him the necessity there was of more econom in his household, gave him a list of many person whose attendance was superfluous. The dok after reading it, said—" It is very true that I ca do without all these people, but have you wi them if they can do without me ?" UNIVERSITIES. No wonder that Oxford and Cambridge profoun On a lady's entering the assembly-room York, Sterne asked her name: he was told it a Mrs. Hobson; on which he said," he had of heard of Hobson's choice, but he never sas before." SKIN AND GRIEF. Thy nags (the leanest things alive), INCOME-TAX. Horne Tooke is said to have given in his r under the property-tax, as having an incon only sixty pounds a year. Being, in e quence, summoned before the commissioners found fault with his return, and desired i explain how he could live in the style b with so small an income; he replied, had much more reason to be dissatisfied w smallness of his income than they had; that their enquiry, there were three ways in people contrived to live above their i namely, by begging, borrowing, and steali he left it to their sagacity, which of these p he employed, |