THE PORTFOLIO OF MR. PETER POPKIN.

235

Ah, the

sible, and he arrived at the part where Monsieur Jacques salutes the girls. Here the whole gallery started up, and cried out, ould thief!" This concluded the performance.

HARLEY, LORD OXFORD.

At Lord Oxford's seat at Wimple, there hung a fine picture of Harley in his robes as Speaker, with the roll of the bill in his hand for bringing in the House of Hanover, which was supposed to have been accomplished by his casting vote. In allusion to Harley's being afterwards sent to the Tower, Prior wrote with a pencil on the white scroll, "Bill paid, 16th July 1715."

Harley, like many an ex-minister, became hypochondriacal in the latter part of his life. His active mind, not having any pabulum to feed it, began to prey upon itself. He became deaf, or at least thought himself so. When some one asked him whether he had ever observed himself to be deaf when he was in office, "Faith, replied he, "I was then so afraid of my head, that I did not attend very much to my ears."

MONSIEUR DE VIVONNE.

Monsieur de Vivonne, who was commander of the French expedition against Messina, writing from that place to the King, closed his letter in these words, "May it please your Majesty, to finish the affair we only want ten thousand men." He gave his letter to seal to Du Terron, commissioner of the army, who was bold enough to add," and a general."

COLLEY CIBBER.

This actor was extremely haughty as a theatrical manager, and very insolent to dramatists. When he had rejected a play, if the author desired him to point out the particular parts of it which displeased him, he took a pinch of snuff, and answered in general terms, Sir, there is nothing in it to coerce my passions."

ABSENT BRIDEGROOM.

In 1787 John Philip Kemble married the widow of Brereton, (she was formerly Miss P. Hopkins), Mr. and Mrs. Bannister undertook to give them a wedding-dinner. By some accidental alteration in the play-bills, Kemble was annotinced to perform at Drury Lane theatre on that evening. He therefore quitted his bride, and a very agreeable party at Bannister's house, to toil through five acts of Hamlet. After which, totally forgetting that he had been married in the morning, and adhering to old and constant habit, he walked from the theatre to his own house, and seated himself in his easy chair, with his lamp and his book, in his library. The bride and party waited, in due expectance of the arrival of the tragedian; but in vain. Bannister was compelled to convey the lady to her husband, who, (as Bannister informed the writer,) was rather astonished at the intrusion of visitors at that time of night.

"THE LIGHT FANTASTIC TOE."

Robert Jobling was dancing at an evening party; Jobling was almost as fat as Falstaff. A lady remarked, that for so corpulent a

person "his dancing was extremely light." "Light, madam," said Barnaby; "how can you be surprised at that, considering his taper legs!"

R. S. V. P.

An old-fashioned couple, in 1806, received a card of invitation to dinner from some much gayer folks than themselves. At the bottom of the card was the then new R. S. V. P. This puzzled the worthy pair. It might puzzle us in these days, although most of us are a little better acquainted with the French,-" Respondez s'il vous plait." The old gentleman took a nap upon it, from which he was awaked by his helpmate, who said, after shaking him up, "My love, I have found it out. R. S. V. P. It means - remember six very punctual."

TOMMY ATKIN.

Dear old Tommy! All who have had the pleasure to be acquainted with Mr. Whitbread, or Southill, during a number of years, must have known that fine old fellow, Tommy Atkin. We can tell a few tales of him. Alas, he is dead and gone! With all his fooleries, his whims, his extravagances, there was a jovial kind heart about him, that endeared him to most of the persons to whom he was introduced. His first connection with Samuel Whitbread was at college. Tommy Atkin, being an extremely entertaining companion, was afterwards invited by his friend, Samuel, to pass a week at his seat in Bedfordshire. Tom accepted the invitation gratefully, and, to prove his gratitude, he remained a guest of that opulent, distinguished, and worthy family, for THIRTY THREE YEARS! More of this eccentric old boy,

anon.

HOOD-WINKED.

On the facetious Thomas Hood coming to town one day, he called on an equally facetious friend, well known in the literary world, with the intention of dining with him. The friend, however, happened to have an engagement; but, as he had reasons for not treating Hood with any want of hospitality, and knowing that he must return to Enfield early, he asked Hood to accompany him to a veterinary surgeon's, where he was compelled to go on business. The friend, knowing Hood's state of stomach, took him to see a horse's tail cut off! an operation which positively induced Hood to decline any idea of eating a dinner.

ELEGANT COMPLIMENT.

When Rousseau was banished from Geneva, he landed at Dover, January 11th, 1766, and visited Drury Lane theatre on the 23rd, to witness the performance of Zara and Lethe, by command of their Majesties. Upon this occasion Garrick played Lusignan and Lord Chalkstone. Rousseau was much gratified, and complimented him by saying, "Sir, you have made me cry at your tragedy, and laugh at your comedy, though I scarce understood a word of your language."

DR. JONES'S SHOE TAX.

This tax was proposed in January 1787. Mr. Rose had a very favourable opinion of it, and it was calculated that it would bring an addition to the revenue of about four hundred thousand pounds per

annum. Of this tax Major Topham remarked, that "Dr. Jones and his shoe-tax had already been productive of many a pinching apprehension; and for any club, in town or country, we give it as a toast to our fellow-sufferers, " May Dr. Jones's shoe be on Mr. Pitt's last!”

A SENSIBLE LITTLE BOY.

A friend of Mr. Cartwright, the celebrated dentist, took his son to have his mouth inspected by that able artist, who, with wonderful celerity, removed seven of the boy's first teeth. Upon the boy crying out with surprise, and a little pain, Cartwright said, "Never mind, Johnny, your teeth will come again."

Johnny, with tears in his eyes, inquired, "Will they come again before dinner, Mr. Cartwright?"

THE EARL OF CHESTERFIELD.

In the winter 1776, in one of the public rooms at Bath, the young Lord Chesterfield accidentally dropped his snuff-box. A gentleman, who was standing near snatched it instantly from the floor, and politely returned it to the noble owner. His lordship, with great indifference, turned away his head, and pocketed his box, without seeming to notice the favour, which conduct extorted from the finder the following severe but pertinent exclamation: "I am positive," said he, "that gentleman never read Lord Chesterfield's letters."

LOVE'S SECOND SIGHT.

I LOVED thee long before we met,
My dreams had traced thy form so well;
I heard thy name, nor could forget
The tender music of its spell.

And when at last I saw those eyes,

They seem'd no wand'ring fires unknown,

But stars, that from my native skies

Their beams o'er all my life had thrown.

When thou wert mine, I ask'd my heart
What meant its strange foreboding fear,
That whisper'd we were doom'd to part,
Even when most happy and most dear?

Although the bloom was on thy cheek,
To me it wore a hue of gloom;
The tones that would thy fondness speak
Sigh'd like the wind around a tomb.

Too much my trembling heart has known
That casts a shade on coming years;

The present never was my own,—
And, oh! how sad the past appears!

Alas! the fatal gift was vain

That taught how frail my hopes must be

Time found me, after years of pain,

All unprepared for losing thee!

LOUISA STUART COSTELLO.

238

IRISH INVENTION.

BY P. M'TEAGUE, ESQ.

How comes it, as we often hear it said, that we Irish people, living so near England, -that England, which (according to the map) seems to be actually hugging Ireland; or (turned another way) carrying her on her back, as our honest women here so dearly love to carry their children, how comes it, as people fancy, that we are not so inventive as our neighbours, or nurses? That we "don't take after the mother;" spin so little cotton; have such little specks of rail-roads; and don't yet build or furnish our steamers? These might be puzzling questions, and I believe frequently prove so to the uninitiated, particularly when we call to mind how very kind and tender-hearted, and generous, England has been to us, and what pains she has taken in our education! ("Bad manners to you, Larry, where's your bow?") But to us, learned as we are in such matters at least, not at all so: and proud and happy do I feel in having this opportunity of assuring my readers that I can most agreeably undeceive them; and if I don't convince them that Ireland is a country of invention, and deep invention, too; and that since the world began no people have existed half so full of invention as the Irish, I will give them leave to look as cross at me as they please when we meet again.

The only difference, then, between English and Irish inventions consists in the following points. That English inventions are merely mechanical, while Irish inventions are amusingly hyperbolical; and if in some respects exciting to risibility, yet disclosing in others a world of wonder, with an attendant moon of instruction.

To illustrate my argument as an Irishman, look at the spinningjennies, as they call them,-was there ever such sameness? No variety; all as like one another as two pins. Now we could not bear that. The very idea of such shoals of things all turning the same way would bother us out of our senses. But, if one could be made to go one way, and one another way, that might do; or if they would leave off having so many Jennies all together, and let some Jemmy's come among them, that might be better still. "By the powers! ther' 'ud be twisting and turning enough then!"

Also, "in regard to them steam-ships and railways," we have heard all about them from the cattle-dealers and pig-drivers, and don't like them at all. Here's a case of hardship.

"Terry Donohoe tuk twinty pigs all the way over to Liverpool, and hurted and damaged the' wor in the big shtamer; for some av thim had the hair, and schnouts, an' tails burnt aff, by r'ason they 'ud be rubbing thimselves ag'in the shimmeny, which, though painted black (which desaved the pigs) was red-hot all the time. Well, as we were saying, Terry got what was left of his twinty pigs, and saw them safe put into a big box they carry them in to MANSHESSTHER, and that was on the 'thrain,' an' he taking a small glass of sperrets with a fr'ind, after all the salt water he had on the say, which brings an the 'druthe.'

"Murder!' siz Terry, where 's me pigs?' siz Terry.

66 6

Halfways to Manshessther be this,' siz a big, red-nosed fellow, with his two hands stuck in his two breeches-pockets.

"Will I catch thim?' says Terry.

"To be sure you will, if you run quick enough,' siz the man wid the big nose, siz he.

"So aff Terry started at the top of his speed, and hadn't run five miles before he found all his pigs on the thrain, or the rails, or whatever they call them, cut into little bits, and the heads av thim shmashed so he couldn't tell one from another; and divil o' bit o' satisfaction ever he got from the 'boord of the commet'hee of directhurs,' only they tould him that sometimes, when the craturs are unruly, the wheels of the pig-boxes do come aff, and that whenever sich a thing happened, their rules made them cut the pigs into soorsedges."

After this plain, if not affecting recital, well might the pig-driver exclaim, "What soort of inventions are these, I wonder, that 'ud burn the hair, and tails, and shnouts' aff of a poor man's pigs, and then have them cut into bits and soorsedges? Also, "what kind of justice from the Boord of the commet hee of Directhurs'?"

"

And, we might add, what would our poor people be without their wit, their humour, and invention? Nothing! absolutely nothing but a half-starved, ignorant, and shivering race, in rags and tatters, possessing, in fact, nothing in their compositions to form a study, create an interest, or raise a smile.

But, set their wits at work-their native, racy, unfathomable wits, -attend to the peculiar shrug of the shoulders, the deep twinkle of the eye, as Paddy draws "at sight" upon the overflowing stores of his invention; and first most solemnly declaring that "he would scorn to tell his honour a lie," or "that the devil a word of lie was in it," he will give you at a moment's warning a string of pure inventions not to be rivalled or surpassed by all the romancers in the world.

The most common occurrence upon which poor Paddy is questioned will be ingeniously turned, or coaxed, or twisted into numerous different versions, just as he thinks he can most successfully gratify the person he is addressing, most efficiently serve his own purposes, or tickle and amuse any bystander. Should, however, his ready eye detect either suspicion or displeasure, straightway, and without the slightest embarrassment, he will recompose his narrative, and will just as readily swallow all he had previously said, as a well-cooked potato.

Of course most people, and you in particular, who are expecting nothing else, see through this flimsy kind of scheming at once; but the curiosity of the case lies in this- that Paddy himself is equally aware of probable detection; and yet, from some unaccountable desire to bother, flatter, or humbug you,-cannot for the soul of him desist.

However you may regret the want of truth and principle, such scenes as these are frequently amusing; Paddy forces you to laugh at some ridiculous tale or conceit, which has little or no foundation, and all the while is but too frequently endeavouring to divert your attention from some deeper-laid scheme of roguery, such as I have before endeavoured to represent in the history of Watty Flaherty.

To a certain extent I had a kind or a "soort" of a Watty Fla