1831.] The Steam-Boat; a Paper of my Uncys. 203 



Bi'iareus ; a diamond upon every finger, and a swingeing garnet, set in 

 pearls, in the plaited frill of an uncleanly shirt. His coat behind was 

 monstrously distended; a bunch of huge gold-seals descended halfway 

 to his knee, as if it he had been the chancellor of all the states of Europe, 

 with the official signets hanging from his fob. With a silk hat, extra- 

 vagantly pointed fore and aft, and most ambitiously erected at the 

 sides — and the addition of a quizzing ( ! ) glass, of the largeness of a 

 patent crumpet, the attire of this imknown is accurately now before 

 you. 



I answered " 1 could venture to pronounce that man a Jew." On 

 walking forward, the justice of my guess was palpable. IMr. Solomon, 

 with the wisdom natural to such a name, had made business the com- 

 panion of his pleasure ; and having calculated on the thoughtlessness of 

 numbers bent on an excursion — all for fun — had come profusely stored 

 with every sort of cheap but gaudy trinket, which could win the eye 

 and tax the folly of his fellow passengers. His clothes were absolutely 

 aU pockets, outside and in ; so many repertories in which his wares were 

 notably deposited. His magazines were rife with every bauble — rings, 

 scissars, tweezers, corkscrews, broaches, knives, and nut-crackers. The 

 last production raised a roar of laughter ; but a gentleman, who asked 

 the owner, what the use of crackers was without the nuts, was ansYv^ered 

 " that there was a friend of hissen who had got some fresh ones down 

 below." An exquisite, who volunteered to quiz the Jew, was not, however, 

 to be prevailed on as a purchaser ; but after an enormity of chaffering, which 

 shewed no hopes of sale or purchase, the Israelite amused tlie party by 

 offering in his turn to become a buyer — when he asked the disconcerted 

 puppy — " if he hadn't got no dublicates to sell .'"' The effect of such a 

 question on the grandeur of a coxcomb, who would not be thought to 

 understand its import, was altogether irresistible. Sectaries are unfairly 

 chosen as the butts of underling wits ; and here, it was quite regaling 

 to a looker-on to mark the triumph of the Jew. He answered all the 

 bantering of his Christian persecutors with a clothed acumen, with a 

 bitterness of jesting repartee, which the ludicrous badness of his 

 speech and the artifice of a coerced smile, could hardly rob of its resent- 

 ful character ; but the house of Issachar, with lucre in their view, have 

 drunk the cup of ignominious patience, under all forms of polity — in all 

 climes — in the midst of every faith. I believe, if the majesty of Satan 

 were to tempt the eagerness of speculation by erecting a bazaar within 

 his torrid settlements, the names of Levy, Solomons, or Isaacs, would be 

 the first to shine on the commercial porches of his rising factory. 



The fondness and simplicity of Mrs. Gobbleton were sources of ainuse- 

 ment all day long. Good heart ! she viewed with an applauding smile 

 the nuisances incessantly committed by her children, and wondered any 

 living creature could regard them with a less indulgent eye. The names, 

 too, of her very ugly, and, in one or two instances, deformed produc- 

 tions, were adopted from the heroines and heroes or divinities of heathen- 

 ism. IMaster ilercules was rather bandy and hump-backed, particularly 

 feeble to apyiearance, with a huge head that would have suited Poly- 

 phemus, and the rest of his dimensions were no larger than a dwarf's. 

 Miss Psyche Gobbleton was a kind of squat she- Vulcan, red-haired, 

 squinted, and spent her day in sucking lollypops. Endymion was the 

 likeness of a flat-nosed Javanese. Alcibiades, the flower of tlie flock, 

 had a pauuch like un alderniun, stammered frightfully, and was much 



