o forth,
does not possess as well as yourself? Snorter has never been in decent
society in his life. He thinks the bar-mess the most fashionable
assemblage in Europe, and the jokes of "grand day" the ne plus ultra of
wit. Snorter lives near Russell Square, eats beef and Yorkshire-pudding,
is a judge of port-wine, is in all social respects your inferior.
Well, it is ten to one but in the case of Snooks v. Jorrocks, before
mentioned, he will be a better advocate than you; he knows the law of
the case entirely, and better probably than you. He can speak long,
loud, to the point, grammatically--more grammatically than you, no
doubt, will condescend to do. In the case of Snooks v. Jorrocks he is
all that can be desired. And so about dry disputes, respecting real
property, he knows the law; and, beyond this, has no more need to be
a gentleman than my body-servant has--who, by the way, from constant
intercourse with the best society, IS almost a gentleman. But this is
apart from the question.

Now, in the matter of auctioneering, this, I apprehend, is not the case,
and I assert that a high-bred gentleman, with good powers of mind and
speech, must, in such a profession, make a fortune. I do not mean in all
auctioneering matters. I do not mean that such a person should be called
upon to sell the good-will of a public-house, or discourse about the
value of the beer-barrels, or bars with pewter fittings, or the beauty
of a trade doing a stroke of so many hogsheads a week. I do not ask a
gentleman to go down and sell pigs, ploughs, and cart-horses, at Stoke
Pogis; or to enlarge at the Auction-Rooms, Wapping, upon the beauty of
the "Lively Sally" schooner. These articles of commerce or use can be
better appreciated by persons in a different rank of life to his.

But there are a thousand cases in which a gentleman only can do justice
to the sale of objects which the necessity or convenience of the genteel
world may require to change hands. All articles properly called of taste
should be put under his charge. Pictures,--he is a travelled man, has
seen and judged the best galleries of Europe, and can speak of them as
a common person cannot. For, mark you, you must have the confidence
of your society, you must be able to be familiar with them, to plant a
happy mot in a graceful manner, to appeal to my lord or the duchess in
such a modest, easy, pleasant way as that her grace should not be hurt
by your allusion to her--nay, amused (like