eated with his Mistress between himself and Giorgioni; Guido was
accompanied by his own Aurora, who took a dice-box from him; Claude
held a mirror in his hand; Rubens patted a beautiful panther (led in
by a satyr) on the head; Vandyke appeared as his own Paris, and
Rembrandt was hid under furs, gold chains and jewels, which Sir Joshua
eyed closely, holding his hand so as to shade his forehead. Not a word
was spoken; and as we rose to do them homage, they still presented the
same surface to the view. Not being _bona-fide_ representations of
living people, we got rid of the splendid apparitions by signs and
dumb show. As soon as they had melted into thin air, there was a loud
noise at the outer door, and we found it was Giotto, Cimabue, and
Ghirlandaio, who had been raised from the dead by their earnest desire
to see their illustrious successors--

"Whose names on earth
In Fame's eternal records live for aye!"

Finding them gone, they had no ambition to be seen after them, and
mournfully withdrew. "Egad!" said B----, "those are the very fellows I
should like to have had some talk with, to know how they could see to
paint when all was dark around them?"

"But shall we have nothing to say," interrogated G. J----, "to the
Legend of Good Women?"--"Name, name, Mr. J----," cried H---- in a
boisterous tone of friendly exultation, "name as many as you please,
without reserve or fear of molestation!" J---- was perplexed between
so many amiable recollections, that the name of the lady of his choice
expired in a pensive whiff of his pipe; and B---- impatiently declared
for the Duchess of Newcastle. Mrs. Hutchinson was no sooner mentioned,
than she carried the day from the Duchess. We were the less solicitous
on this subject of filling up the posthumous lists of Good Women, as
there was already one in the room as good, as sensible, and in all
respects as exemplary, as the best of them could be for their lives!
"I should like vastly to have seen Ninon de l'Enclos," said that
incomparable person; and this immediately put us in mind that we had
neglected to pay honour due to our friends on the other side of the
Channel: Voltaire, the patriarch of levity, and Rousseau, the father
of sentiment, Montaigne and Rabelais (great in wisdom and in wit),
Moliere and that illustrious group that are collected round him (in
the print of that subject to hear him read his comedy of the Tartuffe
at the house of Ninon; Rac