5.  A picture story.  I am invited to a dinner where a rich New Yorker has asked some connoisseur friends to inspect his new purchase, a Raffaelle Madonna and child, for which he has just given a fabulous amount of dollars.  I was asked for special judgment as an artistic Englishman.  Well:  the drawing was perfect; but I didn’t like the colouring:  I knew the picture, having seen the original somewhere on the Continent:  but this couldn’t be a copy, as it was less than life-size; so, while most of the other guests praised profusely, I requested to withhold my opinion of its merits till I could examine it in daylight,—­which, as I was to sleep in the house, was easy next morning.  When my eager host appeared, I took him alone after breakfast into his study, and proved to him what, alas!  I had too truly suspected, that however well painted with the over-accuracy of a miniature and absolutely correct as was the drawing,—­his prize Raffaelle was after all only an oil-coloured engraving!  This he wouldn’t believe, triumphantly showing me the ancient canvas at the back:  but when I told him that between that canvas and the paint he would find paper, and when a penknife scratch under the frame-edge proved it,—­he naturally stormed at the dealer who had taken him in, until I suggested a disgorging of the dollars, and promising my own silence as to the discovery, left him a wiser man and a grateful.

6.  How often the poor letter H has crushed oratory and destroyed eloquence!  Do I not remember how notably a late Lord Mayor raised the echoes of the Egyptian Hall to an explosion of laughter, by commencing grandiloquently, “When hi survey the dignity of my ’igh position,” &c. &c.; and similarly what a disastrous effect a certain preacher caused in church by the announcement, “This is the hare, come let us kill him?” But we all know the mysteries of H and W:  AEsop Smith wrote a fable about them, whereof this is the finale:  “H,” said King Cadmus, “one of my oldest friends! never can I spare your respectable presence; your ancestor is the throat-uttered Heth of Moses; even as you, dear W, are descended from the stately digamma of Homer.  Believe me, I value both of you all the more for graceful ambiguities:  mystery is priceless to your king, and your usage is obscure:  therefore do I lay upon you higher honour.  Henceforth, ye vowel magnates, and you my faithful commons consonants, take heed that no one be accounted literate or eloquent who places these my oldest friends in a dilemma.  Their right use is a mystery; so be it; but woe be unto those whose innate want of taste profanes that mystery.  Honour be to H, and worship be to W; and let those who misuse their secret excellences dread the vengeance of King Cadmus!”

7.  Yet a seventh whimsical anecdote rises to the surface.  When Prince Albert was made a fellow of Lincoln’s Inn, and dined in the New Hall, I was present at the banquet.  There was a roast joint and one bottle of port to each mess of four barristers:  one would think a supply more than ample:  however, some thirsty souls wanted more wine for the great occasion, and the complaint found utterance ludicrously thus.  When the National Anthem was sung, some young lawyer who gave the solos, with a good tenor voice and no end of dry humour, raised a gale of laughter and applause by singing very devoutly—­