326 Notes (/the Month on [MARCH, 



This is all very captivating. But one of the best hits was the observa- 

 tion of a neighbouring rector of high classical attainments : tf The 

 reverend sexton/' said he, " may in one instance be culpable as, he 

 hides his talent in the earth ; but, in another, he is meritorious for he 

 clearly is ' able to dig, and to beg he is not ashamed.' " 



whether promoted or not, we cannot say. But the grave-digging 

 expedient we think better still, on the principle that when a man is at 

 the lowest, any change must be a rise. We wonder whether the Bishop 

 of London has ever seen this coadjutor of the doctor and the hangman 

 laying the dust. 



The old proverb " Noscitur a sociis" is curiously exemplified in the 

 crowd of Byron's familiars, among whom Hobhouse arid Moore are 

 almost the only respectable survivors, as they were almost the only men 

 of respectable habits, for Hobhouse has long been sick of radicalism, 

 and Mr. Moore has, to his honour, made every amends in his power for 

 Mr. Little. But where are the set with whom he flourished his fantasies 

 in the face of the staring world his Cambridge fellow rakes, his Italian 

 fellow libellers, and his Greek fellow banditti ? Even his English man 

 of business could not escape the fatality. Hanson was once a thriving 

 man ; he is now " across the Atlantic," we believe, in that delightful 

 land of refuge for the Rowland Stephensons. Byron was drawn in to 

 busy himself in Lord Portsmouth's marriage with Hanson's daughter. 

 Her thanks, it seems, was given to his lordship. A miserable exposure 

 occurred some few years ago, which ended in making her Miss Hanson 

 again. The " good girl," as he calls her, was not thought to be " a good 

 wife." 



te Received many and the kindest thanks from Lady Portsmouth, 

 pere and mere, for my matchmaking. I don't regret it, as she looks the 

 Countess well, and is a very good girl. It is odd how well she carries 

 her new honours. She looks a different woman, and high-bred. I had 

 no idea I could make so good a peeress/' 



It came out on the inquest into Lord Portsmouth's brains, that at the 

 time of making this match, he was " madder than the maddest of March 

 hares," and that all sorts of dexterity were used to make the " good girl" 

 a countess. But with this Byron was, we take it for granted, unac- 

 quainted, as he was then but a boy. Or if he knew it, he probably, in 

 the saturnine spirit of his poet days, looked upon it as a capital joke on 

 the aristocracy ; of which, worshipping the class, he seems to have 

 hated every individual. 



The Universal-knowledge sixpenny system finds no advocates in us. 

 Nor have we yet been enabled, with all our inquiries, to discover a single 

 cobbler turned into a genius by the whole steam-engine-pamphlet pro- 

 cess. On the contrary, we will confess, that so strong are our preju- 

 dices, that if we should find our tailor proving by the differential cal- 

 culus, that three yards of cloth ought be charged to his customers as 

 six, we should seriously hesitate to employ him for the equipping of our 

 person ; that if our wine merchant demonstrated by the most refined 

 solution of Cubics, that the less wine and the more logwood there was in 

 his casks, the more Burgundy was the result^ we should be much 



