he dined
alone with the earl of Orrery, he said of one that waited in the room,
"That man has, since we sat to the table, committed fifteen faults."
What the faults were, lord Orrery, from whom I heard the story, had not
been attentive enough to discover. My number may, perhaps, not be exact.

In his economy he practised a peculiar and offensive parsimony, without
disguise or apology. The practice of saving being once necessary, became
habitual, and grew first ridiculous and at last detestable. But his
avarice, though it might exclude pleasure, was never suffered to
encroach upon his virtue. He was frugal by inclination, but liberal by
principle; and if the purpose to which he destined his little
accumulations be remembered, with his distribution of occasional
charity, it will, perhaps, appear, that he only liked one mode of
expense better than another, and saved, merely that he might have
something to give. He did not grow rich by injuring his successors, but
left both Laracor and the deanery more valuable than he found them. With
all this talk of his covetousness and generosity, it should be
remembered that he was never rich. The revenue of his deanery was not
much more than seven hundred a year.

His beneficence was not graced with tenderness or civility; he relieved
without pity, and assisted without kindness; so that those who were fed
by him could hardly love him.

He made a rule to himself to give but one piece at a time, and,
therefore, always stored his pocket with coins of different value.

Whatever he did, he seemed willing to do in a manner peculiar to
himself, without sufficiently considering, that singularity, as it
implies a contempt of the general practice, is a kind of defiance which
justly provokes the hostility of ridicule; he, therefore, who indulges
peculiar habits, is worse than others, if he be not better.

Of his humour, a story told by Pope[106] may afford a specimen.

"Dr. Swift has an odd, blunt way, that is mistaken by strangers for
ill-nature. 'Tis so odd, that there's no describing it but by facts. I'll
tell you one that first comes into my head. One evening, Gay and I went
to see him: you know how intimately we were all acquainted. On our
coming in, 'Heyday, gentlemen, (says the Doctor,) what's the meaning of
this visit? How came you to leave all the great lords that you are so
fond of, to come hither to see a poor dean?' 'Because we would rather
see you than any of them.' 'Aye, any