Part 12 (1/2)

A SNAIL DINNER

The chemical philosophers, Dr Black and Dr Hutton, were particular friends, though there was so extremely opposite in their external appearance and lish pronunciation, and with punctilious accuracy of expression, both in point of ist, Dr Hutton, was the very reverse of this: his conversation was conducted in broad phrases, expressed with a broad Scotch accent, which often heightened the humour of what he said

It chanced that the two Doctors had held so fro on the testaceous creatures of the land, while those of the sea were considered as delicacies Wherefore not eat snails? they are known to be nutritious and wholesome, and even sanative in so the richest delicacies, and the Italians still esteeastronomic experiment should be made at the expense of the snails The snails were procured, dieted for a time, and then stewed for the benefit of the two philosophers, who had either invited no guests to their banquet, or found none who relished in prospect the _piece de resistance_ A huge dish of snails was placed before them: still, philosophers are but an to revolt against the experiust on the snails, they retained their awe for each other, so that each, conceiving the syan, with infinite exertion, to s, in very small quantities, the th, showed the white feather, but in a very delicate manner, as if to sound the opinion of his messmate ”Doctor,” he said, in his precise and quiet manner--”Doctor--do you not think that they taste a little--a very little, green?” ”D----d green! d----d green!

indeed--tak' the up fros of abhorrence So ended all hopes of introducing snails into the modern _cuisine_; and thus philosophy can no more cure a nausea than honour can set a broken limb--_Sir Walter Scott_

CURRAN'S IMAGINATION

”Curran!” (says Lord Byron) ”Curran's the ination!--there never was anything like it that I ever heard of

His _published_ life--his published speeches, give you no idea of the ination, as sorammatic machine” Upon another occasion, Byron said, ”the riches of Curran's Irish iination were exhaustless I have heard that h I saw him seldom, and but occasionally I saw hirand confluence between the Rhone and the Saone; they were both so d----d ugly, that I could not help wondering how the best intellects of France and Ireland could have taken up respectively such residences”

COWLEY AT CHERTSEY

The poet Cowley died at the Porch House, Chertsey, on the 21st of July, 1667 There is a curious letter preserved of his condition when he removed here from Barn Elms It is addressed to Dr Sprat, dated Chertsey, 21 May, 1665, and is as follows:--

”The first night that I careat a cold, with a defluxion of rheum, as made me keep my chamber ten days And, too, after had such a bruise on my ribs with a fall, that I am yet unable to move or turn in with And besides, I can get no ht by cattle put in by nifies, or may come to in ti but hanging”----”I do hope to recover h it be uncertain yet whether I shall ever recover it) as to walk about again And then, ht be very ht very conveniently coht I write this in pain, and can say no more--_Verbum sapienti_”

It is stated, by Sprat, that the last illness of Coing to his having taken cold through staying too long a his labourers in the meadows; but, in Spence's _Anecdotes_ we are informed, (on the authority of Pope,) that ”his death was occasioned by a reat friend, Dean Sprat, ith hihbour of Cowley's, who, (according to the fashi+on of those times,) made them too welcome They did not set out for their walk home till it was too late; and had drank so deep that they lay out in the fields all night This gave Cowley the fever that carried him off The parish still talk of the drunken Dean”

A PRETTY COMPLIMENT

Although Dr Johnson had (or professed to have) a profound and unjustified conte hireat politeness; and once, when she called to see him at Bolt Court, and his servant Frank could not immediately furnish her with a chair, the doctor said, ”You see, ot_”

THOMAS DAY, AND HIS MODEL WIFE

Day, the author of _Sandford and Merton_, was an eccentric but amiable man; he retired into the country ”to exclude himself,” as he said, ”from the vanity, vice, and deceptive character of ely jilted by woe of twenty-one, and after his suit had been rejected by a young lady to whoular project of educating a wife for himself This was based upon the notion of Rousseau, that ”all the genuine worth of the human species is perverted by society; and that children should be educated apart from the world, in order that their norant of, its vices, prejudices, and artificial irls fro Hospital; previously to which he entered into a written engageuaranteed by a friend, Mr Bicknell, that within twelve n one of them to a respectable mistress, as an apprentice, with a fee of one hundred pounds; and, on her ive her the additional sued that he would act honourably to the one he should retain, in order to e his mind, he would allow her a coive her five hundred pounds as a dowry

The objects of Day's speculation were both twelve years of age One of theht hair and eyes; the other was a brunette, with chesnut tresses, as styled Sabrina He took these girls to France without any English servants, in order that they should not obtain any knowledge but what he should iht have been anticipated, they caused him abundance of inconvenience and vexation, increased, in no s infected with the small-pox; from this, however, they recovered without any injury to their features The scheme ended in the utter disappointment of the projector Lucretia, whom he first dismissed, was apprenticed to a milliner; and she afterwards became the wife of a linendraper in London Sabrina, after Day had relinquished his attempts to make her such a model of perfection as he required, and which included indo secrets, was placed at a boarding-school at Sutton Coldfield, in Warwickshi+re, where she was th married to Mr Bicknell

After Day had renounced this scheme as impracticable, he became suitor to two sisters in succession; yet, in both instances, he was refused At length, he was e fortune the enerosity”

WAshi+NGTON IRVING AND WILKIE, IN THE ALHAMBRA