112 REMINISCENCES, ETC. 



work and labour done by him the attorney for him the squire 

 aforesaid. Mr. Smith's footman, hearing that the bearer of 

 the hostile missive had something important to communi- 

 cate to his master, introduced him into his private study, 

 when Mr. Smith, on hearing the object of his message, 

 under the influence of irritated feelings at the annoyance, 

 immediately knocked him down. The young man was glad to 

 effect his exit from the wrathful old gentleman of sixty- 

 nine, and sent him a summons to appear at Marylebone 

 Police Court for the assault on the following day. Mr. Smith, 

 upon receiving this, went to the Temple to consult a friend 

 learned in the law upon the subject of his appearance before 

 the magistrate. After hearing the squire's story, which he 

 with difficulty got through, being somewhat out of breath 

 with indignation at being called upon for payment, and with 

 having to mount four pair of stairs in order to reach the 

 lawyer's sanctum, the expounder of Blackstone on the rights 

 of persons ventured to suggest to him that he had some- 

 what exceeded the bounds of decorum, and asked whether 

 it would not be advisable, considering Mr. Smith's position 

 in society, to ofler the attorney's clerk a five-pound note 

 and get him to withdraw the summons. Upon this counsel 

 being tendered to him, the squire's anger, which had been 

 hitherto kept under with some effort, burst forth, and look- 

 ing up at the ceiling, to the astonishment of the man of 

 law, he exclaimed, " Good God, Sir, your chambers let in 

 the rain !" The fact was, that in the plenitude of his ire 

 the perspiration trickled in large drops over hu face, and 

 this he mistook for the moisture of the heavens. Precipi- 

 tately leaving the chambers, he faced the charge next day 

 before Mr. Broughtou, nearly committed a second assault, 

 was fined five pounds, and appeared on a subsequent morn- 

 ing in the columns of the Morning Post, under the heading 

 of " An irate Provisional." 



The above anecdote proves that Mr. Smith occasionally 

 gave way to his temper. He used to say that " his father 



