n led astray by the statement
in Crabb-Robinson's Diary to the effect that Hazlitt used to attend
Captain Burney's whist-parties "till he affronted the Captain by severe
criticisms on the works of his sister," presumably by his article in the
Edinburgh Review in 1814. Hazlitt commemorates Lamb's evenings in the
"Pleasure of Hating" ("Plain Speaker"): "What is become of 'that set of
whist players,' celebrated by Elia in his notable _Epistle to Robert
Southey, Esq._ ... 'that for so many years called Admiral Burney friend?'
They are scattered, like last year's snow. Some of them are dead--or gone
to live at a distance--or pass one another in the street like strangers;
or if they stop to speak, do it as coolly and try to _cut_ one another as
soon as possible. Some of us have grown rich--others poor. Some have got
places under Government--others a _niche_ in the Quarterly Review. Some of
us have dearly earned a name in the world; whilst others remain in their
original privacy. We despise the one, and envy and are glad to mortify the
other."

_Like angels' visits_. Cf. Blair's "The Grave," 582: "Like those of
angels, short and far between." Hazlitt was fond of pointing out this
source for Campbell's famous line "Like angels' visits few and far
between," and of insisting that the alteration spoiled the sense. Thereby
he is said to have incurred Campbell's bitter hostility.

P. 306. _Mr. Douce_, Francis (1757-1834), Shakespearian scholar and keeper
of the manuscripts in the British Museum.

_L. H----_. Leigh Hunt. There is a sketch of him in the "Spirit of the
Age."

_aliquando sufflaminandus erat_. "He sometimes had to be checked." This is
a quotation from Seneca which Ben Jonson in "Timber" (ed. Schelling, p.
23) had applied to Shakespeare.

P. 307. _The Indicator_. Leigh Hunt's most successful series of essays,
which began their run in 1819.

_Mr. Northcote_, James (1746-1831), the painter of whose talk Hazlitt has
left an entertaining record in the "Conversations of James Northcote"
(1830), a book which inspired Crabb-Robinson to say, "I do not believe
that Boswell gives so much good talk in an equal quantity of his life of
Johnson."

P. 308. _Sir Joshua's_. Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792), the famous
English painter.

P. 309. _Horne Tooke_ (1736-1812), politician and author of a celebrated
philological volume, "The Diversions of Purley" (1786, 1805). His portrait
is included in the "Spirit of the Age": "He was w