troduce us, a profound
silence fell upon the room, and we anxiously looked out of the windows,
hoping every moment that Thackeray would arrive. This untoward state of
things went on for one hour, still no Thackeray and no dinner. English
reticence would not allow any remark as to the absence of our host.
Everybody felt serious and a gloom fell upon the assembled party. Still
no Thackeray. The landlord, the butler, and the waiters rushed in and
out the room, shrieking for the master of the feast, who as yet had not
arrived. It was confidentially whispered by a fat gentleman, with a
hungry look, that the dinner was utterly spoiled twenty minutes ago,
when we heard a merry shout in the entry and Thackeray bounced into the
room. He had not changed his morning dress, and ink was still visible
upon his fingers. Clapping his hands and pirouetting briskly on one leg,
he cried out, "Thank Heaven, the last sheet of The Virginians has just
gone to the printer." He made no apology for his late appearance,
introduced nobody, shook hands heartily with everybody, and begged us
all to be seated as quickly as possible. His exquisite delight at
completing his book swept away every other feeling, and we all shared
his pleasure, albeit the dinner was overdone throughout.

The most finished and elegant of all _lecturers_, Thackeray often made a
very poor appearance when he attempted to deliver a set speech to a
public assembly. He frequently broke down after the first two or three
sentences. He prepared what he intended to say with great exactness, and
his favorite delusion was that he was about to astonish everybody with a
remarkable effort. It never disturbed him that he commonly made a woful
failure when he attempted speech-making, but he sat down with such cool
serenity if he found that he could not recall what he wished to say,
that his audience could not help joining in and smiling with him when he
came to a stand-still. Once he asked me to travel with him from London
to Manchester to hear a great speech he was going to make at the
founding of the Free Library Institution in that city. All the way down
he was discoursing of certain effects he intended to produce on the
Manchester dons by his eloquent appeals to their pockets. This passage
was to have great influence with the rich merchants, this one with the
clergy, and so on. He said that although Dickens and Bulwer and Sir
James Stephen, all eloquent speakers, were to precede him, he