is brief visit with no appreciable benefit.
Charles Mackay tells us that he met him and his constant friend,
Thackeray, at Evans' supper-rooms in December, 1863. "They both
complained of illness, but neither of them looked ill enough to justify
the belief that anything ailed them beyond a temporary indisposition,
such as all of us are subject to. Leech was particularly despondent, and
complained much of the annoyances to which he was subjected by the
organ-grinders of London, and by the dreadful railway whistles at the
stations whenever he left town. His nerves were evidently in a high
state of tension, and I recommended him, not only as a source of health
and amusement, but of profit, to take a voyage across the Atlantic, and
pass six months in America, where he would escape the organ-grinders,
street-music, and the railway-whistles, and bring back a portfolio
filled with sketches of American and Yankee character. 'I am afraid,' he
replied, 'that B. & E. [Bradbury & Evans] would not like it. Besides, I
should not like to be absent from _Punch_ for so long a time.'
'Nonsense,' said Thackeray, 'B. and E. would highly approve, provided
you sent them sketches. _I_ think it a good idea, and you might put five
thousand pounds in your pocket by the trip. The Americans have never
been truly portrayed, as you would portray them. The niggers alone would
be a little fortune to you.' Leech shook his head dubiously, and I
thought mournfully, and no more was said upon the subject."[158]

Nevertheless, the end of one at least of these steady friends and men of
genius was drawing near with sure and rapid strides. Both were present
at the anniversary of the death of the founder of the Charterhouse,
"good old Thomas Sutton," on the 12th of that same month of December,
1863. At the celebration of Divine service at four o'clock, Thackeray
occupied his accustomed back seat in the quaint old chapel; from thence
he went to the oration in the Governor's room; and as he walked up to
the orator with his contribution, the great humourist, Mr. Theodore
Taylor, tells us, was received "with such hearty applause as only
Carthusians can give to one who has immortalized their school."[159] At
the banquet which followed he sat by the side of John Leech, who was one
of the stewards, and proposed the time-honoured toast, _Floreat AEternum
Carthusiana Domus_, in a speech which was received with three times
three and one cheer more. John Leech replied to th