210 Notes of the Month on [FEB. 



superseded Philadelphia, and even New York, as the general receptacle 

 of " the unfortunate brave," the asylum of those men of genius, who 

 have too much talent to live in England, the favoured spot of regeneration 

 for those brilliant speculators whose conceptions equally outrun their 

 credit and their age. However, the majority are clearly for Paris ; and 

 the objects of the visit are said to be political, and not personal. The 

 friends of the ex-ministers, it is understood, have succeeded in engaging 

 him ; and he is about to put in operation a very extensive system of 

 counter-irritation among the canaille of the French capital. Should his 

 exertions be attended with success, he will, on his return, be retained by 

 the Home-office, and despatched into the disturbed districts to counter- 

 irritate the erring disciples of " Swing." 



On the whole, we are convinced that St. John Long will be seriously 

 missed at the West-end. His house was a pleasant lounge ; his choco- 

 late was unimpeachable, whatever his honesty might be ; no one could 

 ever question the strength of his coffee, whatever might be surmised of 

 his science ; and the sandwiches which promenaded the rooms regularly 

 every half-hour, were a triumphant answer to all the aspersions that his 

 patients lived upon air. We have no doubt that it was a much pleasanter 

 place than the bazaars, to which such hosts of old peeresses order their 

 carriages every day at one, with such matchless punctuality, to buy 

 sixpence- worth of ribbon, and kill three hours. To this, St. John Long's 

 promenade was a paradise. The comfortable manner in which all the 

 comforts of the old ladies were provided for ; the pleasantries arising from 

 the nature of the scene between the various rubbed ; the files of young 

 women, with their mouths fixed to gas-pipes, and imbibing all sorts of 

 vapours ; and, never to be forgotten in the catalogue of attractions, 

 the men of all ages who came to Jearn the art of being cured of all 

 calamities, that of the purse inclusive. Then, too, St. John's own 

 judicious generosity ; the presents of invaluable snuff, of first-growth 

 Champagne, of Mocha coffee to one, and of gunpowder tea to another, 

 shewed a knowledge of women and human 'nature, that must, but for 

 the malice of justice, inevitably have led to fortune. What will now 

 become of the countess, who led her daughters to this palace of Hygeia 

 as regularly as the day came ; and with a spirit worthy of the great 

 cause, declared that, if she had twenty daughters, she would take every 

 one of them every day to the same place, for the same rubbing ? What 

 will become of the heavy hours of him who declared St. John's gas p. 

 qualification for the Cabinet, and that a sick minister applying to this 

 dispenser of all virtue, would be on his legs in the House, and making ? 

 victorious speech within the twenty-four hours ? What will become of the 

 battalion of beauties who, at every puff of the gas-pipe, ran to then 

 mirrors, and received the congratulations of the surrounding dandies, 01 

 the revived carnation of their cheeks ? " Othello's occupation's o'er." But 

 a St. John Long, of some kind or other, is so essential to the West-end 

 world, that a successor must be rapidly erected in his room. Every age 

 has its St. John Long, formed by the mere necessities of the opulent and 

 idle. A new Perkins, with a packet of metallic tractors on a new scale- 

 would be extremely acceptable in any handsome street in the neighbour, 

 hood of Grosvenor-square. Animal magnetism would thrive prodigiously 

 between this and the dust-months, when London is left to the guardsmen 

 and the cab-drivers ; and when, as Lady Jersey says, nobody who is 



