 perused his Morning Post. He
could not have faced the day without his two hours' toilet, without his early
cup of tea, without his Morning Post. I suppose nobody in the world except
Morgan, not even Morgan's master himself, knew how feeble and ancient the Major
was growing, and what numberless little comforts he required.
    If men sneer, as our habit is, at the artifices of an old beauty - at her
paint, perfumes, ringlets; at those innumerable, and to us unknown, stratagems
with which she is said to remedy the ravages of time and reconstruct the charms
whereof years have bereft her - the ladies, it is to be presumed, are not on
their side altogether ignorant that men are vain as well as they, and that the
toilets of old bucks are to the full as elaborate as their own. How is it that
old Blushington keeps that constant little rose-tint on his cheeks; and where
does old Blondel get the preparation which makes his silver hair pass for
golden? Have you ever seen Lord Hotspur get off his horse when he thinks nobody
is looking? Taken out of his stirrups, his shiny boots can hardly totter up the
steps of Hotspur House. He is a dashing young nobleman still as you see the back
of him in Rotten Row: when you behold him on foot, what an old, old fellow! Did
you ever form to yourself any idea of Dick Lacy (Dick has been Dick these sixty
years) in a natural state, and without his stays? All these men are objects whom
the observer of human life and manners may contemplate with as much profit as
the most elderly Belgravian Venus or inveterate Mayfair Jezebel. An old
reprobate daddy-longlegs, who has never said his prayers (except perhaps in
public) these fifty years; an old buck, who still clings to as many of the
habits of youth as his feeble grasp of health can hold by - who has given up the
bottle, but sits with young fellows over it, and tells naughty stories upon
toast-and-water - who has given up beauty, but still talks about it as wickedly
as the youngest roué in company - such an old fellow, I say, if any parson in
Pimlico or St. James's were to order the beadles to bring him into the middle
aisle, and there set him in an armchair, and make a text of him, and preach
about him to the congregation, could be turned to a wholesome use for once in
his life, and might be surprised to find that some good thoughts came out
