of the staircase of the house that he condescended to visit. Mr. Brummell has told me, continued the professor, that to enter a coach was torture to him. Conceive,' said he, 'the horror of sitting in a carriage with an iron apparatus, afflicted with the dreadful thought, the cruel apprehension, of having one's leg crushed by the machinery! Why are not the steps made to fold outside? The only detraction from the luxury of a vis-a-vis, is the double distress! for both legs-excruciating idea!'"

CHAPTER VIII.

Practical Jokes.-The Emigré-Mr. Snodgrass-The Beau's Canine Friend-Affectation-J. W. C—r, and Bloomsbury SquareBrummell's Mots-A Travelled Bore-Vegetable Diet—A Limping Lounger-A New Way of accounting for a Cold-A Bad SummerThe Advantages of Civility-Prince Boothby and Mrs. Clopton Parthericke-Sheridan's Bet.

In the commencement of the last chapter I alluded to the tricks that Brummell played, meaning thereby practical jokes,—a species of frolic highly amusing to the bystanders, until it is their turn to suffer,-and in which he excelled. His predecessor, George Selwyn, and his contemporary, Sheridan, who loved one another as cordially as wits generally do, were also adepts in puerilities of this kind. Mr. Moore, in his Life of Sheridan, says that he once induced Tickell to run after him into a dark passage, which he had covered with plates, having, however, taken good care to leave a path for himself. Tickell was much cut; but, when Lord John Townshend came to condole with him, after a little show of indignation against his friend, he could not help exclaiming, "But how amazingly well it was done!" Brum

mell's jokes in this way were well done also; and, as is frequently the case, were practised upon those who could not retaliate.

In one instance his victim was an old émigré, whom he met on a visit at Woburn or Chatsworth, into whose powder he managed, in concert with a certain noble friend, to introduce some finely-powdered sugar; and the next morning Monsieur le Marquis, in perfect ignorance of the trick, after having been "bien sucre," descended as usual to the breakfasttable. He had, however, scarcely made his bow, and inserted his knife into the Périgord-pie before him, when the flies (for the heat was extreme) already attracted to the table by the marmalade and honeycomb, began to transfer their attentions to his head; and before the segment of pie was finally detached, every fly at the table had settled on it. The carving-knife was relinquished, to drive them away with his pocket-handkerchief, but the attempt was futile; they rose for a second, but resettled instantly; a few, indeed, winged their way to the distant parts of the room, but only to return with a reinforcement of their friends, who were vainly seeking a livelihood on the windows.

Murmurs of astonishment escaped from the company, as this new batch assailed Monsieur le Marquis; he fanned his head, but it was of no use; he shook it vehemently, but with no better success; at length, the sugar becoming dissolved by the heat, trickled in saccharine rivulets over his forehead,

which was soon covered by his tormentors, buzzing and tickling so dreadfully, that even old régime impassibilité could stand it no longer. The unfortunate Frenchman started to his feet, and violently clasping his head with both his hands, rushed from the room, enveloped in a cloud of powder and flies; his tormentors, and the echoes of an uncontrollable burst of laughter, following him up the staircase. When he was gone, Brummell and his confederate, of course, expressed more surprise than any one else, that the flies should have taken such a violent fancy to the Frenchman's powder and pomatum.

Another gentleman, who suffered by his pranks, was a Mr. Snodgrass, I believe an F.R.S., and very fond of scientific pursuits; probably the reason why he was singled out by Brummell as a fit and proper object for his fun. Accompanied by several friends, he once knocked up this savant, at three o'clock on a fine frosty morning; and when, under the impression of his house being on fire, he protruded his body en chemise, and his head in a nightcap, from the window, the Beau put the following very interesting question to him "Pray, sir, is your name Snodgrass?" "Yes, sir," said he, very anxiously, "my name is Snodgrass." "Snodgrass - Snodgrass," repeated Brummell, "a very odd name that, upon my soul; a very odd name indeed! But, sir, is your name really Snodgrass?" Here the philosopher, with the thermometer below freezing point, naturally got into a towering passion, and threatened to call the watch; where

:

!

upon Brummell walked off, with-" Good morning to you, Mr. Snodgrass."

Such were the absurd tricks in which Brummell indulged; and though he was not a wit in the literal sense of the word, like Lord Erskine, Sheridan, or Jekyll, he had a happy facility in placing the most ordinary circumstances in a ridiculous point of view, and never refrained, when opportunity offered, from indulging his taste for exciting the risible muscles even of those who, very probably, thought but little of his talent in this way. He had, also, a singular power of giving an agreeable effect to a word or action, that in any one else would have been perhaps unnoticed; or, if noticed-condemned: but his happy hardihood generally carried him through the difficulties into which. his fearless love of originality sometimes plunged him. It was, I believe, from one of his odd speeches that a certain gentleman, well known in the world, received the sobriquet of Poodle Byng. It seems that Mr. Byng had in his youth very beautiful hair, which curled naturally, and it was his practice, not an unusual one in the days of curricles, to be accompanied in his by his French dog. One day Brummell, who was on horseback, met them quietly driving together in the park, and hailed his friend with, "Ah, Byng, how do you do?—a family vehicle, I see !"

His affectation, which was principally assumed for the purpose of amusing those about him, was another characteristic of his wit. He pretended to look upon the City as a terra incognita; and when some great