eg upon it,
or whistling with it on his mouth, are such great reliefs to him in
conversation, that he does not know how to be good company without it.

"That he is at present engaged in an amour, and must despair of success
if it be taken from him.

"Your petitioner, therefore, hopes, that the premises tenderly
considered, your Worship will not deprive him of so useful and so
necessary a support.

"And your petitioner shall ever, etc."

Upon the hearing of his case, I was touched with some compassion, and
the more so, when, upon observing him nearer, I found he was a prig. I
bade him produce his cane in court, which he had left at the door. He
did so, and I finding it to be very curiously clouded with a transparent
amber head, and a blue riband to hang upon his wrist, I immediately
ordered my clerk Lillie to lay it up, and deliver out to him a plain
joint headed with walnut; and then, in order to wean him from it by
degrees, permitted him to wear it three days in a week, and to abate
proportionably till he found himself able to go alone.

The second who appeared came limping into the court; and setting forth
in his petition many pretences for the use of a cane, I caused them
to be examined one by one, but finding him in different stories, and
confronting him with several witnesses who had seen him walk upright,
I ordered Mr. Lillie to take in his cane, and rejected his petition as
frivolous.

A third made his entry with great difficulty, leaning upon a slight
stick, and in danger of falling every step he took. I saw the weakness
of his hams; and I bade him leave his cane, and gave him a new pair
of crutches, with which he went off in great vigour and alacrity. This
gentleman was succeeded by another, who seemed very much pleased while
his petition was reading, in which he had represented, That he was
extremely afflicted with the gout, and set his foot upon the ground with
the caution and dignity which accompany that distemper. I suspected him
for an impostor, and, having ordered him to be searched, I committed
him into the hands of Doctor Thomas Smith in King Street, my own
corn-cutter, who attended in an outward room: and wrought so speedy
a cure upon him, that I thought fit to send him also away without his
cane.

While I was thus dispensing justice, I heard a noise in my outward room;
and inquiring what was the occasion of it, my door-keeper told me, that
they had taken one up in the very fact as he was