My plaguy ancestors! if they had left me but a Van or a Mac, or an Irish O’, it had been something to qualify it.—­Mynheer Van Hogsflesh—­or Sawney Mac Hogsflesh,—­or Sir Phelim O’Hogsflesh,—­but downright blunt------.  If it had been any other name in the world, I could have borne it.  If it had been the name of a beast, as Bull, Fox, Kid, Lamb, Wolf, Lion; or of a bird, as Sparrow, Hawk, Buzzard, Daw, Finch, Nightingale; or of a fish, as Sprat, Herring, Salmon; or the name of a thing, as Ginger, Hay, Wood; or of a colour, as Black, Grey, White, Green; or of a sound, as Bray; or the name of a month, as March, May; or of a place, as Barnet, Baldock, Hitchin; or the name of a coin, as Farthing, Penny, Twopenny; or of a profession, as Butcher, Baker, Carpenter, Piper, Fisher, Fletcher, Fowler, Glover; or a Jew’s name, as Solomons, Isaacs, Jacobs; or a personal name, as Foot, Leg, Crookshanks, Heaviside, Sidebottom, Longbottom, Ramsbottom, Winterbottom; or a long name, as Blanchenhagen, or Blanchenhausen; or a short name, as Crib, Crisp, Crips, Tag, Trot, Tub, Phips, Padge, Papps, or Prig, or Wig, or Pip, or Trip; Trip had been something, but Ho------.

(Walks about in great agitation,—­recovering his calmness a little, sits down.)

Farewell the most distant thoughts of marriage; the finger-circling ring, the purity-figuring glove, the envy-pining bride-maids, the wishing parson, and the simpering clerk.  Farewell, the ambiguous blush-raising joke, the titter-provoking pun, the morning-stirring drum.—­No son of mine shall exist, to bear my ill-fated name.  No nurse come chuckling, to tell me it is a boy.  No midwife, leering at me from under the lids of professional gravity.  I dreamed of caudle. (Sings in a melancholy tone) Lullaby, Lullaby,—­hush-a-by-baby—­how like its papa it is!—­(makes motions as if he was nursing).  And then, when grown up, “Is this your son, Sir?” “Yes, Sir, a poor copy of me,—­a sad young dog,—­just what his father was at his age,—­I have four more at home.”  Oh! oh! oh!

Enter Landlord.

MR. H.
Landlord, I must pack up to-night; you will see all my things got ready.

LANDLORD
Hope your Honor does not intend to quit the Blue Boar,—­sorry any thing
has happened.

MR. H.
He has heard it all.

LANDLORD
Your Honour has had some mortification, to be sure, as a man may say;
you have brought your pigs to a fine market.

MR. H.
Pigs!

LANDLORD
What then? take old Pry’s advice, and never mind it.  Don’t scorch your
crackling for ’em, Sir.

MR. H.
Scorch my crackling! a queer phrase; but I suppose he don’t mean to
affront me.

LANDLORD
What is done can’t be undone; you can’t make a silken purse out of a
sow’s ear.

MR. H.
As you say, Landlord, thinking of a thing does but augment it.

LANDLORD
Does but hogment it, indeed, Sir.