Dr. Hough, of Worcester, was remarkable for evenness of temper, of which the following story affords a proof.  A young gentleman, whose family had been well acquainted with the doctor, in making the tour of England before he went abroad, called to pay his respects to him as he passed by his seat in the country.  It happened to be at dinner-time, and the room full of company.  The bishop, however, received him with much familiarity; but the servant in reaching him a chair, threw down a curious weather-glass that had cost twenty guineas, and broke it.  The gentleman was under infinite concern, and began to make an apology for being the occasion of the accident, when the bishop with great good nature interrupted him.  “Be under no concern, sir,” said his lordship, smiling, “for I am much beholden to you for it.  We have had a very dry season; and now I hope we shall have rain.  I never saw the glass so low in my life.”  Every one was pleased with the humour and pleasantry of the turn; and the more so, as the Doctor was then more than eighty, a time of life when the infirmities of old age make most men peevish and hasty.

A Test.—­A cobbler at Leyden, who used to attend the public disputations held at the academy, was once asked if he understood Latin?  “No,” replied the mechanic, “but it is easy to know who is wrong in the argument.”  “How?” enquired his friend.  “Why, by seeing who is first angry.”

Casaubon, in his “Treatise on the Passions,” relates the following pleasing anecdote of Robert, one of the greatest monarchs that ever swayed the sceptre of France.  Having once surprised a rogue who had cut away the half of his mantle, he took no other notice of the offence than by saying mildly to him, “Save thyself, sinner, and leave the rest for another who may have need of it.”

Garrick once complained to Sir Joshua Reynolds of the abuse with which he was loaded by Foote, when Sir Joshua answered, that Foote, in so doing, gave the strongest possible proof of being in the wrong; as it was always the man who had the worst side who became violent and abusive.

TIME, VALUE OF.

Spare Moments.—­The great French Chancellor D’Aguesseau carefully employed every moment of his time.  Observing that Madame D’Aguesseau always delayed ten or twelve minutes before she came down to dinner, he began to compose a work to which he intended to devote these few minutes, which would otherwise have been lost.  The result was, at the end of fifteen years, a work in three large quarto volumes, which went through several editions.