Tea to
his Friends,' himself still the sole actor, and changing with
Proteus-like celerity from one to the other. Then came his 'Auction of
Pictures,' and Sir Thomas de Veil, one of his enemies, the justices, was
introduced. Orator Henley and Cock the auctioneer figured also; and year
after year the town was enchanted by that which is most gratifying to a
polite audience, the finished exhibition of faults and follies. One
stern voice was raised in reprobation, that of Samuel Johnson: he, at
all events, had a due horror of buffoons; but even he owned himself
vanquished.

'The first time I was in Foote's company was at Fitzherbert's. Having no
good opinion of the fellow, I was resolved not to be pleased: and it is
very difficult to please a man against his will. I went on eating my
dinner pretty sullenly, affecting not to mind him; but the dog was so
very comical, that I was obliged to lay down my knife and fork, throw
myself back in my chair, and fairly laugh it out. Sir, he was
irresistible.' Consoled by Foote's misfortunes and ultimate complicated
misery for his lessened importance, Bubb Dodington still reigned,
however, in the hearts of some learned votaries. Richard Bentley, the
critic, compared him to Lord Halifax--

'That Halifax, my Lord, as you do yet,
Stood forth the friend of poetry and wit,
Sought silent merit in the secret cell,
And Heav'n, nay even man, repaid him well.

A more remorseless foe, however, than Foote appeared in the person of
Charles Churchill, the wild and unclerical son of a poor curate of
Westminster. Foote laughed Bubb Dodington down, but Churchill
perpetuated the satire; for Churchill was wholly unscrupulous, and his
faults had been reckless and desperate. Wholly unfit for a clergyman, he
had taken orders, obtained a curacy in Wales at L30 a year--not being
able to subsist, took to keeping a cider-cellar, became a sort of
bankrupt, and quitting Wales, succeeded to the curacy of his father, who
had just died. Still famine haunted his home; Churchill took, therefore,
to teaching young ladies to read and write, and conducted himself in the
boarding-school where his duties lay, with wonderful propriety. He had
married at seventeen; but even that step had not protected his morals:
he fell into abject poverty. Lloyd, father of his friend Robert Lloyd,
then second master of Westminster, made an arrangement with his
creditors. Young Lloyd had published a poem called 'The Actor;'
Chur