The Merry Past 



sent your footman to Paris, and as you find you 

 cannot make a dentist of him, you come back to me. 

 My terms are now one hundred guineas, to be paid 

 before you leave this room. If you do not, I know 

 you must and will return, and then the price shall be 

 two hundred, and so on increasing, till you do come, 

 as I know you must come at last." The Duke felt 

 that the dentist was right in his conjecture, and to 

 avoid the consequence paid the money. 



This dentist fared better with his Grace of Queens- 

 berry than he afterwards did with George the Fourth, 

 who, when he entered into fashionable life, sent for 

 March, as the most eminent dentist of his day, with 

 the intention of employing him. When the dentist 

 was ushered into the presence, he began, in his usual 

 manner, by telling His Royal Highness that he must 

 have fifty guineas before he could see into his mouth. 

 The Prince, irritated by this, ordered him to be turned 

 instantly into the street. 



In the early years of the nineteenth century a 

 well-known figure in the West End was Sir John 

 Dinely, a little old man, about seventy, rivalling Old 

 Q in years, and surpassing him in gaiety. He used 

 to wear scarlet small-clothes, a blue waistcoat, and 

 orange coat ; over all of which was a large shabby 

 drab greatcoat. A large King Charles's wig, highly 

 powdered, crowned his head, uncovered by any hat. 

 And, as if this dress were not sufiiciently attractive, 

 he was wont to hold aloft a large silk umbrella, pre- 

 sumably in order to protect his delicate countenance 

 from the sun, and to put to the blush the petty 



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