Sit in the Vicar’s seat:  you’ll hear
    The doctrine of a gentle Johnian,
  Whose hand is white, whose tone is clear,
    Whose phrase is very Ciceronian. 
  Where is the old man laid?—­look down. 
  And construe on the slab before you,
  Hic jacet
    GULIELMUS BROWN,
  Vir nulla non donandus lauru.

New Monthly Magazine.

* * * * *

TAILORS.

There is nothing upon earth that is of so much utility to men in general as fine clothes.  A splendid equipage, a magnificent house, may draw the gaze of idle passers, and excite an occasional inquiry.  But who, that has entered taverns and coffeehouses, has not perceived that the ratio of civility and attention from the waiter is regulated by the dress of his various customers?  Any stranger, elegantly and fashionably attired, will find little difficulty in obtaining deference, politeness, and even credit, in every shop he enters; whereas the stranger, in more homely, or less modish garb, is really nobody.  In truth, the gentleman is distinguished in the crowd only by the cut of his trousers, and he carries his patent of nobility in his coat-lap.  And to whom does he owe this index of his identity, but to his despised and much calumniated tailor?

There is not a metamorphosis in all the pages of Ovid so wonderful as that which the great magician of the shears and thimble is capable of effecting.  If there be the most unpleasant disproportions in the turn of your limbs—­any awkwardness or deformity in your figure, the enchantment of this mighty wizard instantly communicates symmetry and elegance.  The incongruous and unseemly furrows of your shape become smooth and harmonized; and the total want of all shape is immediately supplied by the beautiful undulations of the coat, and the graceful fall of the pantaloons.  And all this is by the potency of your tailor.  His necromantic skill, unlike that of too many practisers of supernatural arts, is exercised only for the benefit of the world:  and whilst Circe transformed the companions of Ulysses into brute beasts, the benevolent enchanter of our day transforms brute beasts into handsome and attractive men.  Nay, had Olympus been furnished with a tailor, Brotheus would have had no necessity to burn himself to death for the purpose of escaping ridicule from the gods on account of his deformity.

But he who is most indebted to this manufacturer of elegant forms, is the lover; and the base ingratitude of this sort of person is dreadfully enormous.  After he has riveted the gaze of his mistress upon his charming figure, drawn forth sighs of admiration for his remarkable elegance, excited the most tender perturbations by the grace of his movements, and finally acquired a complete surrender of her heart by the striking interest of his attitude when kneeling at her feet, he ignorantly and presumptuously ascribes