looked often at the clock, long before the wished-for relief of the carriages has come."

"This seems perfectly savage," said I; and I looked at Fawknor, who seemed perfectly to agree with me; but Blythfield only laughed at our surprise. When I intreated him, however, to finish the description of his day, he said, "Faith, I am almost ashamed; not because I fear being laughed at, but because I have no right to the selfish but delightful indulgences which the total abstraction from the restraints of the world confer upon one that can suffice to himself."

"For heaven's sake let us hear these indulgences!" "You will be disappointed," said he; "there can be no want of companions while there are books."

"After dinner, then, is your time for study: and what are your subjects?"

"Almost always the world. I never could dive into the abstruser sciences; as Gray once said, 'I am not a metaphysician, and have not the eyes of a cat, to see in the dark; nor a mathematician, with those of an eagle, to see in too much light. But the world! men! manners! human nature! These charm me in all descriptions of them, of which, thank Heaven, excellent, just, witty, amusing, instructive, there is no want. With these for my associates, I can want no conversation to give zest to my wine after dinner."

"But your authors! We shall get at your tastes and objects by them. I suppose Hume, and Adam Smith, and Montaigne, or La Bruyère; perhaps the Spectator!"

"Nothing so didactic. That would be preaching over one's liquor, which is not to my taste; but Le Sage and your namesake are held by me in the highest honour; to say nothing of Humphrey Clinker, or some other such book (if any such can be found of equal fidelity and humour). This, though ever so solitary, transports me back into the world, without the trouble of being in ⚫ it; it makes me laugh aloud, though by myself; and I should be glad to know of you gentlemen of that world, how many men there are in it, besides yourselves, that could prove half such entertaining companions."

This was a hit we could not parry; so I asked what other authors he had besides.

"There is Sir Walter," returned he.

"The best of all," I observed. "I see you want no company; I only fear we are in the way: but pray go on with the account.

"I have little more to tell," said he. "I call for coffee; perhaps I compose an essay-a bad one, I grant you, but as nobody sees it, no matter; perhaps I compose myself to sleep,-to which I sometimes am invited by neither more nor less than the rhythm of that high clock, whose pendulum has given me many a doze; for its lulling witchery (as I may call it,) has often soothed me like the lullaby of a child, and made my sleep almost as sweet. But of this, I see by your laughing, you are unworthy; and, indeed, I am not surprised at it; for I must tell you, if you have not yet discovered it, that these day-sleeps can only be really enjoyed by those who have no cares or hankerings after the world; and, above all, who have nothing on their consciences -no quarrel with themselves."

I almost felt reproved by this serious ending of the philosopher of ease, who certainly knew very well how to cure our disposition to laugh at him, if we had it. I entreated him, therefore, to go on.

"Well," said he, "I rise refreshed for a walk, which only ends with twilight; and with none but my thoughts for my companions; which, if I find them worth recording, I commit to paper: and so to bed."

Both Fawknor and myself bowed our thanks; and for once, I said, I should be among his enviers; though I feared I should not be believed in Mayfair, if I told what I sincerely thought of his way of life.

The evening closed in, after a walk in a very odoriferous and prolific garden, which surrounded three parts of the house; and as Fawknor was to start early in the morning to rejoin the Grandborough party, Blythfield said it would be good for his health if, for once, he went to bed at eleven o'clock.

His butler then appearing with a pair of massive candlesticks and bougies, preceding our steps, our host

himself conducted us to our rooms, as he said his father and grandfather had always made a rule of doing when distinguished strangers did him the honour to visit him. He then took leave of Fawknor, thanking him for the favour he had conferred upon him, with an air, and in a tone of self-possession, amounting almost to dignity; which evidently gave my companion something like surprise.

Left alone with him previous to my retiring, "I wonder," said I, "what your report will be to the Grandboroughs of their cousin: I should like to know."

"It is difficult to say," returned he, "for I know it not myself. There seem so many contrasts in the man, of bluntness and ceremony; of excellent feeling and abrupt chiding; of almost dignity and almost vulgarity; that I shall be puzzled what to say. I am inclined to feel with Lady Grandborough about him, yet cannot fairly oppose her husband's opinion, which is all in his favour."

"I own," said I, "that though he may be plain, I see nothing ill-bred or vulgar in him; but, on the contrary, something that betokens the consciousness of being a man of quality, though of the old school, and not of town-breed. Perhaps, too, I may with him reject Lady Grandborough as a judge; as I would all ladies not born to their rank. At any rate you will allow that he has sense and observation, and seems perfectly happy."

"As happy," returned Fawknor, "as a man with such exceedingly mediocre tastes can perhaps be. But to what does that amount?"

"You could not, then, be as happy yourself in the same situation?”

"Certainly not," said he, with some disdain at my question, "nor any other man of any consequence what

ever."

"Excuse me," said I, "if I think that there is a certain degree of fashion even about him. Not that that constitutes the happiness he enjoys."

"Fashion!" exclaimed Fawknor, "ridiculous!"

"There is a sort of grandeur in his living!" "So there is in the lord mayor's.'

"My good friend, I wish you were a Duke, and never out of Grosvenor Square."

"I wish so, too," said he; and with this we wished one another good night.

Alas! I never saw poor Fawknor more!

SECTION XVIII.

"Weigh what convenience, both of time and means,
May fit us to our shape."

HAMLET.

THE next morning I found my new friend, whose ways and humour had begun to interest me more and more, in his woollen gown and thick slippers, traversing a better sort of basse cour, set round with the neastest offices. He had a basket in his hand, which was no sooner perceived by at least a hundred fowls, and as many pigeons from an old fashioned dovecot, than they beset him, not in vain, for the contents of his basket. It was soon emptied; and the contents, sometimes lòng and bloody, sometimes momentary, to obtain the corn, gave him, he said, an excellent illustration of the right of the strongest.

As he saw me rather surprised, both at his appearance and employment-"It is my amusement," said he, "and though a tame one, not without its interest. You see I have the true Dorking breed, and am not a little envied for my success. I know I have been quizzed

for this behind my back, by the dear Grandboroughs; but I tell them it is all envy; at which my Lady sets up her toss of contempt, (totally forgetting the butler and coach-horse of Lady Teazel,) and is angry with her Lord for only laughing when I call these pleasures of mine natural, theirs artificial. This is generally," added he, "my first employment in the morning, except one; and hoping for your assistance at that, I deferred it; but, remember, I press nobody into the service."

By this I understand him to mean prayers, and I of course assented. The congregation was merely the household;-very orderly and serious, and plainly dressed; save the housekeeper, a good lady, who, as there was company, had put on a silk gown for the honour of the house: for which, as Blythfield told me, he afterwards rated her well. The two men who had had on their state-liveries the day before, now appeared in thickset frock coats and waistcoats; and the upper one enacted the part of clerk most sonorously.

We none of us, I believe, ate the worse breakfast for these our devotions; and being new to it, it impressed me a good deal, if only with a view to the content it seemed to diffuse over the whole ménage, which I noted as a happy one.

I would have left Blythfield after breakfast, but he so pressed me to stay another day, that I complied.

"I have not half iniated you," said he, "into the mysteries of this new life; for new it must be to you. And, besides, I have hopes of you; which is more than I can say of your fine companion, who, I suppose, only came to spy out the nakedness of the land, and is at this moment, no doubt, paying his court to my lady cousin, by describing the Arcturus he has seen. I observed his horror at finding my house elbowed by neighbours, instead of rearing itself, like Grandborough, in the magnificent solitude of a park. Now to me, this vicinity to others is what recommends it. I do not want to be out of the world because I live in the country. If my neighbours are respectable, and exhibit neatness, cheerfulness, and ease in their dwellings, it does not annoy, it rather adds to my content, to see theirs. In this we but