“He, Sir, was not christened by that name.  He could never have written it before he was thirty.  He has assumed it within a year.  The character is bad,—­very bad.  I judge he is a gambler by profession, and—­something worse.  He evidently is not confined to one department of rascality.  He was born and educated in New England, is aged about thirty-nine, is about five feet ten in height, and is broad-shouldered and stout.  His nerves are strong, and he is bold, hypocritical, and mean.  He is just the kind of man to talk like a saint and act like a devil.”

The little company raised their hands in holy horror.

“As to age, size, nerve, etc.,” said the landlord, “you are entirely correct, but in his moral character you are much mistaken”; and the clerk laughed outright.

“Not mistaken at all,” replied Mr. Sidney; “the immorality of the signature is the most perspicuous, and it is more than an even chance that he has graduated from a State’s prison.  At any rate, he will show his true character wherever he remains a year.”

“But, my dear Sir, you are doing the greatest possible damage to your reputation; he is a boarder of mine, and”——­

“You had better be rid of him,” chimed in Mr. Sidney.

“Why, Mr. Sidney, he is the clergyman who has been preaching very acceptably at the ——­ Church these two months!”

“Just as I told you,” said Mr. Sidney; “he is a hypocrite and a rascal by profession.  Will you allow me to demonstrate this?”

The landlord assented.  A servant was called, and Mr. Sidney, having written on a card, sent it to the clergyman’s room, with the request that he would come immediately to the office.  It was delivered, and the landlord waited patiently for his Reverence.

“You think he will come?” asked Mr. Sidney.

The landlord replied affirmatively.

Mr. Sidney shook his head, and said,—­“You will see.”

A short time after, the servant was again ordered to make a reconnoissance, and reported that there was no response to his knocking, and that the door was locked on the inside.  Whereupon Mr. Sidney expressed the hope that the religious society were responsible for the board, for he would never again lead that flock like a shepherd.  It was subsequently ascertained that the parson had in a very irreverent manner slipped down the spout to the kitchen and jumped from there to the ground, and, what is “very remarkable,” like the load of voters upset by Sam Weller into the canal, “was never heard of after."[A]

[Footnote A:  There is a curious story connected with this “clergyman,” which may yet appear in the biography of Mr. S.]

* * * * *

“Individual handwriting,” says Lavater, “is inimitable.  The more I compare the different handwritings which fall in my way, the more am I confirmed in the idea that they are so many expressions, so many emanations, of the character of the writer.  Every country, every nation, every city has its peculiar handwriting.”  And the same might be said of painting; for, if one hundred painters copy the same figure, an artist will distinguish the copyist.