e precise terms of the
forfeit, the provisos for getting out of paying it at last, lead to a
long and inextricable discussion. George Kirkpatrick was, however,
so convinced in his own mind that the _Mourning Bride_ was written by
Shakespear, that he ran headlong into the snare: the bet was decided,
and the punch was drunk. He has skill in numbers, and seldom exceeds
his sevenpence.--He had a brother once, no Michael Cassio, no great
arithmetician. Roger Kirkpatrick was a rare fellow, of the driest
humour, and the nicest tact, of infinite sleights and evasions, of a
picked phraseology, and the very soul of mimicry. I fancy I have some
insight into physiognomy myself, but he could often expound to me at a
single glance the characters of those of my acquaintance that I had been
most at fault about. The account as it was cast up and balanced between
us was not always very favourable. How finely, how truly, how gaily he
took off the company at the Southampton! Poor and faint are my sketches
compared to his! It was like looking into a _camera obscura_--you saw
faces shining and speaking--the smoke curled, the lights dazzled, the
oak wainscotting took a higher polish--there was old Sarratt, tall and
gaunt, with his couplet from Pope and case at Nisi Prius, Mounsey eyeing
the ventilator and lying _perdu_ for a moral, and Hume and Ayrton taking
another friendly finishing glass!--These and many more windfalls of
character he gave us in thought, word, and action. I remember his once
describing three different persons together to myself and Martin Burney,
viz. the manager of a country theatre, a tragic and a comic performer,
till we were ready to tumble on the floor with laughing at the oddity
of their humours, and at Roger's extraordinary powers of ventriloquism,
bodily and mental; and Burney said (such was the vividness of the scene)
that when he awoke the next morning, he wondered what three amusing
characters he had been in company with the evening before. Oh! it was
a rich treat to see him describe Mudford, him of the _Courier,_ the
Contemplative Man, who wrote an answer to Coelebs, coming into a room,
folding up his greatcoat, taking out a little pocket volume, laying it
down to think, rubbing the calf of his leg with grave self-complacency,
and starting out of his reverie when spoken to with an inimitable vapid
exclamation of 'Eh!' Mudford is like a man made of fleecy hosiery: Roger
was lank and lean 'as is the ribbed sea-sand