NIMROUS NORTHERN TOUR. 105 



Williamson, " what the devil do you mean, man, by riding over 

 the wheat ?" 



Farmer. " Why I was thinking " 



Williamson. " Thinking ! what's the use of thinking ! you 

 should reflact." 



Farmer. " But the wheat is my own." 



Williamson. " So much the worse ; therms the force of 

 example."* 



Now there is no longer a doubt but that Williamson can blow 

 up ; but that gem must be rich indeed which can afford to be set 

 without a foil. For my own part, however, were I not Nimrod, 

 I would any day stand a rating from him, for the sake of the 

 peculiarly forcible language in which I know it would be conveyed 

 to me. And suppose I give rather a convincing proof of this 

 power of words, the result of a nervous tone, in the pronunciation 

 of them, which never fails to have effect, particularly in the art 

 of persuading or advising. In his journey to London, in the 

 mail-coach, he obtained sufficient influence over one of his fellow- 

 passengers, a person in a large way of business, to take into his 

 employ a young man upon his sole recommendation, and this to 

 a situation in which much confidence was required. I question 

 whether Demosthenes himself could have done so much by any 

 wary Greek, as Williamson did by his brother Scot, and had he 

 as against another ^schines been pitted against him in the 

 coach, I should have backed the copious simplicity of the hunts- 

 man even against the majestic address of the orator. In power 

 of voice he would not have had a chance with him. 



But have I nothing more to say of my hero during his visit to 

 London ? Yes one little anecdote. " Williamson," said the 

 duke, "you should see some of the lions of London, the two parks, 

 &c. &c. ; ' " Wall, your grace," replied Williamson, " I should 

 greatly like to do so ; but / dorft know the country and shall be 

 lost." The duke immediately ordered one of his own hacks to 

 be saddled for him, and away sallied forth the huntsman, with 

 the duke's pad groom behind him, commanding the respect and 

 admiration of all whom he met. Now Williamson needs not the 

 aid of borrowed plumes ; but there cannot be a doubt that 

 in these days of creation, he was mistaken by many for a newly- 

 made lord for one of old Wetherall's " pitchforked lot," upon 

 a late memorable occasion. 



I have hitherto only been speaking of Williamson as a servant 

 to a noble duke, as a huntsman to a pack of fox-hounds, as a 



* The Aquilian law the reparation of wrongs is in force here ; and 

 a bill for damage is now and then brought in. 



