f the gentlemen like to look into), wears, I am
told, a diamond pin in his shirt-collar, has a music-master to teach him
to play on the flageolet two hours before the maids are up, complains
of confinement and a delicate constitution, and is a complete Master
Stephen in his way.

(3) His account of Dr. Whittle was prodigious-of his occult sagacity,
of his eyes prominent and wild like a hare's, fugacious of followers,
of the arts by which he had left the City to lure the patients that he
wanted after him to the West End, of the ounce of tea that he purchased
by stratagem as an unusual treat to his guest, and of the narrow winding
staircase, from the height of which he contemplated in security the
imaginary approach of duns. He was a large, plain, fair-faced Moravian
preacher, turned physician. He was an honest man, but vain of he knew
not what. He was once sitting where Sarratt was playing a game at chess
without seeing the board; and after remaining for some time absorbed
in silent wonder, he turned suddenly to me and said, 'Do you know, Mr.
Hazlitt, that I think there is something I could do?' 'Well, what is
that?' 'Why, perhaps you would not guess, but I think I could dance, I'm
sure I could; ay, I could dance like Vestris!' Sarratt, who was a man
of various accomplishments (among others one of the Fancy), afterwards
bared his arm to convince us of his muscular strength, and Mrs. Sarratt
going out of the room with another lady said, 'Do you know, Madam, the
Doctor is a great jumper!' Moliere could not outdo this. Never shall I
forget his pulling off his coat to eat beef-steaks on equal terms with
Martin Burney. Life is short, but full of mirth and pastime, did we not
so soon forget what we have laughed at, perhaps that we may not remember
what we have cried at! Sarratt, the chess-player, was an extraordinary
man. He had the same tenacious, epileptic faculty in other things that
he had at chess, and could no more get any other ideas out of his mind
than he could those of the figures on the board. He was a great
reader, but had not the least taste. Indeed the violence of his memory
tyrannised over and destroyed all power of selection. He could repeat
(all) Ossian by heart, without knowing the best passage from the worst;
and did not perceive he was tiring you to death by giving an account of
the breed, education, and manners of fighting-dogs for hours together.
The sense of reality quite superseded the distinction betwee