“Nay, I have known him,” added Mr. Selwyn, “insist upon handing her to her carriage, and then, with an affected kindness, pretend to kiss her hand, instead of which he has almost bit a piece out of it.”

“Pitiful!—­pitiful! sir,” cried the General, “I know nothing more shabby!”

“He was equally inhuman to his daughter,” said Mrs. Thrale, “for, in one of his rages, he almost throttled her.”

“Wretched doings!” again exclaimed Mr. B—­y, “what! cruel to a fair female!  Oh fie! fie! fie!—­a fellow who can be cruel to females and children, or animals, must be a pitiful fellow indeed.  I wish we had had him here in the sea.  I should like to have had him stripped, and that kind of thing, and been well banged by ten of our clippers here with a cat-o’-nine-tails.  Cruel to a fair female?  Oh fie! fie! fie!”

I know not how this may read, but I assure you its sound was ludicrous enough.

However, I have never yet told you his most favourite story, though we have regularly heard it three or four times a day —­And this is about his health.

“Some years ago,” he says,—­” let’s see, how many? in the year ’71,—­ay, ’71, ’72—­thereabouts—­I was taken very ill, and, by ill-luck, I was persuaded to ask advice of one of these Dr. Gallipots:—­oh, how I hate them all!  Sir, they are the vilest pick-pockets—­know nothing, sir! nothing in the world! poor ignorant mortals! and then they pretend—­In short, sir, I hate them all!- I have suffered so much by them, sir—­lost four years of the happiness of my life—­let’s see, ’71, ’72, ’73, ’74—­ay, four years, sir!—­mistook my case, sir !—­and all that kind of thing.  Why, sir, my feet swelled as big as two horses’ heads!  I vow I will never consult one of these Dr. Gallipot fellows again! lost me, sir, four years of the happiness of my life!—­why, I grew quite an object!—–­you would hardly have known me!—­lost all the calves of my legs!—­had not an ounce of flesh left!—­and as to the rouge—­why, my face was the colour of that candle!—­those deuced Gallipot fellows!—­why, they robbed me of four years—­let me see, ay, ’71, ’72—­” 164

And then it was all given again!

We had a large party of gentlemen to dinner.  Among them was Mr. Hamilton, commonly called Single-speech Hamilton, from having made one remarkable speech in the House of Commons against government, and receiving some douceur to be silent ever after.  This Mr. Hamilton is extremely tall and handsome; has an air of haughty and fashionable superiority; is intelligent, dry, sarcastic, and clever.  I should have received much pleasure from his conversational powers, had I not previously been prejudiced against him, by hearing that he is infinitely artful, double, and crafty.

The dinner conversation was too general to be well remembered; neither, indeed, shall I attempt more than partial scraps relating to matters of what passed when we adjourned to tea.