mon,--that it will suit any text.--

--For this sermon I shall be hanged,--for I have stolen the greatest
part of it. Doctor Paidagunes found me out. > Set a thief to catch a
thief.--

On the back of half a dozen I find written, So, so, and no more--and
upon a couple Moderato; by which, as far as one may gather from
Altieri's Italian dictionary,--but mostly from the authority of a piece
of green whipcord, which seemed to have been the unravelling of Yorick's
whip-lash, with which he has left us the two sermons marked Moderato,
and the half dozen of So, so, tied fast together in one bundle by
themselves,--one may safely suppose he meant pretty near the same thing.

There is but one difficulty in the way of this conjecture, which is
this, that the moderato's are five times better than the so, so's;--show
ten times more knowledge of the human heart;--have seventy times
more wit and spirit in them;--(and, to rise properly in my
climax)--discovered a thousand times more genius;--and to crown all, are
infinitely more entertaining than those tied up with them:--for which
reason, whene'er Yorick's dramatic sermons are offered to the world,
though I shall admit but one out of the whole number of the so, so's, I
shall, nevertheless, adventure to print the two moderato's without any
sort of scruple.

What Yorick could mean by the words lentamente,--tenute,--grave,--and
sometimes adagio,--as applied to theological compositions, and with
which he has characterised some of these sermons, I dare not venture
to guess.--I am more puzzled still upon finding a l'octava alta!
upon one;--Con strepito upon the back of another;--Scicilliana upon a
third;--Alla capella upon a fourth;--Con l'arco upon this;--Senza l'arco
upon that.--All I know is, that they are musical terms, and have a
meaning;--and as he was a musical man, I will make no doubt, but that by
some quaint application of such metaphors to the compositions in hand,
they impressed very distinct ideas of their several characters upon his
fancy,--whatever they may do upon that of others.

Amongst these, there is that particular sermon which has unaccountably
led me into this digression--The funeral sermon upon poor Le Fever,
wrote out very fairly, as if from a hasty copy.--I take notice of it
the more, because it seems to have been his favourite composition--It
is upon mortality; and is tied length-ways and cross-ways with a yarn
thrum, and then rolled up and twisted round with a