here sat a dark,
saturnine, corpulent old man, with harsh prominent features, who I was
sure could be none other than the famous author of Gulliver. There were
several others of whom I was not so sure, sitting at the other side of
the table, but I conjecture that both Fielding and Richardson were among
them, and I could swear to the lantern-jaws and cadaverous visage of
Lawrence Sterne. Higher up I could see among the crowd the high forehead
of Sir Walter Scott, the masculine features of George Eliot, and the
flattened nose of Thackeray; while amongst the living I recognised James
Payn, Walter Besant, the lady known as "Ouida," Robert Louis Stevenson,
and several of lesser note. Never before, probably, had such an
assemblage of choice spirits gathered under one roof.

"Well," said Sir Walter Scott, speaking with a very pronounced accent,
"ye ken the auld proverb, sirs, 'Ower mony cooks,' or as the Border
minstrel sang--

'Black Johnstone wi' his troopers ten
Might mak' the heart turn cauld,
But Johnstone when he's a' alane
Is waur ten thoosand fauld.'

The Johnstones were one of the Redesdale families, second cousins of the
Armstrongs, and connected by marriage to----"

"Perhaps, Sir Walter," interrupted Thackeray, "you would take the
responsibility off our hands by yourself dictating the commencement of a
story to this young literary aspirant."

"Na, na!" cried Sir Walter; "I'll do my share, but there's Chairlie over
there as full o' wut as a Radical's full o' treason. He's the laddie to
give a cheery opening to it."

Dickens was shaking his head, and apparently about to refuse the honour,
when a voice from among the moderns--I could not see who it was for the
crowd--said:

"Suppose we begin at the end of the table and work round, any one
contributing a little as the fancy seizes him?"

"Agreed! agreed!" cried the whole company; and every eye was turned on
Defoe, who seemed very uneasy, and filled his pipe from a great
tobacco-box in front of him.

"Nay, gossips," he said, "there are others more worthy----" But he was
interrupted by loud cries of "No! no!" from the whole table; and
Smollett shouted out, "Stand to it, Dan--stand to it! You and I and the
Dean here will make three short tacks just to fetch her out of harbour,
and then she may drift where she pleases." Thus encouraged, Defoe
cleared his throat, and began in this way, talking between the puffs of
his pipe:--

"My father was a well