1830.] George Caiman's Random Records. 311 



harangue grew so much upon Sheridan in his declining days,, that he 

 would, in answering the observation of any person in company, call him 

 " the honourable gentleman." 



" The late Joseph Richardson, Sheridan's ' Jidus Achates^ was, with 

 all his good nature and good temper, a huge lover of this particular 

 kind of disputation. Tell Richardson where you dined yesterday, and 

 he would immediately inquire, ' Had you a good day ? was there much 

 argument ?' " 



Erskine was of the Colman diners-out, and was then what he was 

 when he became more known, and what he continued to his last hour, 

 prodigiously fond of talking, and pre-eminently fond of talking of himself. 



" My father often met Erskine in the street, and invited him to din- 

 ner on the same day. On those occasions, our party, which, when I 

 was at home, formed a trio, might as well have been called a duo, for I 

 was only a listener ; indeed, my father was little more, for Erskine was 

 then young at the bar, flushed with success, and enthusiastic in his pro- 

 fession. He would, therefore, repeat his pleadings in every case. This 

 I thought dull enough, and congratulated myself, (till I knew better,) 

 when the oration was over. But here I reckoned without my host ; for 

 when my father observed that the arguments were unanswerable ' By 

 no means, my dear Sir,' would Erskine say, ' had J been counsel for A. 

 instead of B. you shall hear what I could have advanced on the other 

 side.' Then we did hear, and I wished him at the forum." 



To Bath Colman went like all " the other fine gentlemen about town" 

 for a season. Bath was then the haunt of the ultras of fashion, the 

 original Almack's, with only the difference, that it was on a larger scale, 

 and that, instead of being ruled by the sceptre of Lady Jersey, it sub- 

 mitted to the ruder supremacy of Beau Nash. It had its living absur- 

 dities, as well as its successor. ef The chief exquisite, or dandy, (maca- 

 roni was then the term,) who figured in the Upper Rooms, was the well 

 known Tom Storer, bien poudre, in a fine coat with gold frogs ; he 

 moved the minuet de la cour, in buckram solemnity, pale, tall, thin, and 

 ugly, making strange contortions of his legs when he turned a 

 corner." 



Mrs. De Crespigny's masquerade, at which Colman exhibited as Prince 

 Arthur, extorts from him the very correct opinion, that " an English 

 private masquerade, where people are striving to be clever, is the dullest 

 of all dull vivacity a public one is the most vulgar of vulgar dissipa- 

 tion." In the fury of his anti-masquerade ire he gives some lines, 

 written for the benefit night of Jones the comedian, whom, by a well- 

 deserved compliment, in which we believe the public fully join, he* 

 designates as " one whose domestic worth and gentlemanly manners are 

 equal to his histrionic talents." We give a fragment of them as being 

 among the smartest of their author's, and as hitherto unpublished : 



* # # * # 



" Then pouring in, come punches, Turks, and tailors, 

 Heavy heeled harlequins, and inland sailors. 

 Jews without Hebrew, brogueless Pats from Cork, 

 And clodpoles without dialect from York, 

 Sportsmen, who've scarcely seen a furrow's ridge, 

 And ne'er shot any thing but London bridge. 



