 from cultivating the society of these also, who were men of
ample estates and liberal dispositions; in consequence of which, their parties
were too expensive for the consumptive state of his finances; so that he was
obliged to descend another degree, and mingle with a set of old batchelors and
younger brothers, who subsisted on slender annuities, or what is called a bare
competency in the public funds. This association was composed of second-hand
politicians and minor critics, who in the forenoon saunter in the Mall, or
lounge at shews of pictures, appear in the drawing-room once or twice a week,
dine at an ordinary, decide disputes in a coffee-house, with an air of superior
intelligence, frequent the pit of the play-house, and once in a month spend an
evening with some noted actor, whose remarkable sayings they repeat for the
entertainment of their ordinary friends.
    After all, he found something comfortable enough in the company of these
gentlemen, who never interested his passions to any violence of transport, nor
teazed him with impertinent curiosity about his private affairs: for though many
of them had maintained a very long, close, and friendly correspondence with each
other, they never dreamt of inquiring into particular concerns; and if one of
the two who were most intimately connected, had been asked how the other made
shift to live, he would have answered, with great truth, »Really, that is more
than I know.« Notwithstanding this phlegmatic indifference, which is of the true
English production, they were all inoffensive, good-natured people, who loved a
joke and a song, delighted in telling a merry story, and prided themselves in
the art of catering, especially in the articles of fresh venison and wild fowl.
    Our young gentleman was not received among them on the footing of a common
member, who makes interest for his admission; he was courted as a person of
superior genius and importance, and his compliance looked upon as an honour to
their society. This their idea of his preheminence was supported by his
conversation, which, while it was more liberal and learned than that to which
they had been accustomed, was tinctured with an assuming air, so agreeably
diffused, that instead of producing aversion, it commanded respect. They not
only appealed to him, in all doubts relating to foreign parts, to which one and
all of them were strangers, but also consulted his knowledge in history and
divinity, which were frequently the topics of their debates; and in poetry of
all kinds, he decided with such magisterial authority, as even weighed against
the
