I often met the late Monsieur Etienne Dumont, of Geneva, the friend and commentator of old Jeremy Bentham, at Romilly’s house in London, in 1789.  He was a man of astonishing talents, sagacity, acuteness, and clearness of head.  What part he had in the brilliant effusions of Mirabeau, and in the French Revolution, may be seen by his posthumous work, just published at Paris, entitled Souvenirs de Mirabeau.  He was a short, thick man, of coarse features, blear eyed, and slovenly in his dress; but of mild manners, hospitable, an excellent story-teller, and much beloved.  I think he had been at one time librarian to old Lord Lansdowne.  He died at Milan, in 1829, aged about 70.  The French cannot contain their rage at the exposure that he was the spirit who moved their brilliant Mirabeau.

I was once talking to Anna Maria Porter about him, when she expressed her astonishment at the admiration I bestowed on him!  She said, “I thought you was a Whig, and an aristocrat! how can you commend a revolutionary radical?” I answered, “You mistake his character, he is not a radical in the sense you mean! he considers Tom Paine’s Rights of Man to be mischievous nonsense!” I could not convince her:  but I made my peace with her by praising, with the utmost sincerity, her beautiful novel, The Recluse of Norway.  I found her full of good sense, and with much command of language.  She will forgive me for saying she had not the personal beauty of her gentle sister Jane.  She paid many compliments to the imaginative vivants of the green island; for she perceived by my tones that I was an Irishman, though I am not sure, that she knew even my name; for the company was numerous, and of all countries.  It was an evening assembly, in which the rooms were so full, that one could hardly move.  Tommy Moore was there, and though he is a very little man, he was the great lion of the evening:  all the young ladies were dying to see the bard whose verses they had chanted so often with thrilling bosoms, and tears running down their cheeks.  They were not quite satisfied when they saw a diminutive man, not reaching five feet, with a curly natural brown scratch, handing about an ugly old dowager or two, who fondly leaned upon his arms, even though they discovered them to be ladies of high titles.

Rogers came in late, and went away early, looking sallower and more indifferent than usual.  He paid a few bows and compliments to two or three noble peeresses, and then retired.

The Rev. Thomas Frognel Dibdin was there.  He was very facetious and quaint:  when he found himself by my side, he instantly started off, crying to me; “Brobdignagian; We Lilliputians must not stand by you!  You would make a soldier for the King of Prussia!  Look at that tall lady there, that Miss de V——­; why do you not take her for a wife?” E——­ G——­n heard what he said, and looked fierce at us both!  I expected another Bluviad! Perhaps the ingenious