1832.J Drearywit and his Friends. 403 



dispersed whispers into an 'articulate sententious sound, signifying, that 

 the father of our friend Drearywit was not particular to a shade ; that 

 he did not stick at trifles ; that he knew on which side his bread was 

 buttered, inasmuch as he buttered both sides himself; and that all were 

 fish that came to his net, especially gudgeons. It by no means follows 

 that he was not a highly respectable man, and a member of the common 

 council. Let me indulge a reminiscence respecting him. If the retina 

 of my eye have not deceived me, and my memory prove faithful, my old 

 acquaintance must ever have cut a despicable figure, looked upon as a 

 study for the artist or a model for the sculptor. He was tantum pellis et 

 ossa, so much skin and bone ; in truth, if to inherit no flesh were to be 

 exempt from the " thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to," the 

 outline in question might have laughed and grown fat at his leisure. 

 But he had not soul enough to laugh ; indeed, although according to 

 Shakspeare, a catch could draw three souls out of a weaver, I question 

 whether all the music of the spheres would have extracted the tithe of 

 one from my wretched friend. 



It is a mystery to me, ignorant as I arn of the process by which ideas 

 are generated in the mind, how it could have occurred to the old widow 

 Snatchaway and her daughter that such a penurious rascal should be 

 deemed a desirable speculation. It is still more remarkable that he 

 should have consented to take any woman into stock (for with some 

 men such enterprises are mere matters of business) without being 

 thoroughly satisfied of the pecuniary fitness of the transaction. Certain, 

 however, it is, that elaborate calculations were entered into on his part, 

 during which it was observed that he divided by two, more often than 

 was his custom heretofore. In a word, he was content to do one im- 

 prudent act in his life, upon a principle which I do not understand, but 

 which, at all events, vindicates the existence of the will in a most con- 

 clusive manner. On the lady's side, be it borne in mind, she was now 

 of that most uncertain of ages called " a certain age," by which, let it 

 be understood, she was dancing to and fro upon the vast gamut of time, 

 extending from twenty-nine to sixty inclusive, and no one knew the 

 precise chord upon which she should fairly have reposed herself. 

 Furthermore, there was a fatality in the concern : she had her own 

 private reasons for wishing the thing ; she had dreamed of him; she 

 was born for the man ; her mother had consulted the grounds of the 

 coffee-cup, and such-like Delf-ian oracles ; and, in fine, the two ladies, 

 either by setting, laying, or running their heads together, had made him 

 their own to a dead certainty, long before the match had been even con- 

 templated by him. 



A marriage consequently took place, appertaining to which nothing 

 is half so deserving of mention, or worthy of commemoration, as the 

 birth of our friend ; a circumstance unlocked for at home, and matter 

 of wonderment and whisper to the neighbourhood, which, I must say, 

 generally contrives to interest itself much more in other persons' affairs 

 than the occasion could seem at first, or even at second sight, to warrant. 

 For example, winks and shrugs and smiles were put into requisition ; 

 shrewd guesses were hazarded " he was a wise child that knew his 

 own father," and indirect imputations of the like nature were mumbled, 

 all tending to provoke a breach of the peace and harmony then subsist- 

 ing betweeft a couple whose evenness of temper on the one hand, and 



2 E 2 



