WHERE is the man who has not heard of that ancient and honourable town Kiddywinkle-a town boasting of, according to the last census, no fewer than two hundred and fortyseven inhabitants, and rendered immortal by containing the ashes of a Saxon monarch? I shall never forget the moment in which I first visited the market, and wandered round the streets of this venerable place. An urchin of seven years old, who had never previously waddled out of the village, seven miles distant, in which I had been reared, every step was enchantment, and awe, and amazement. The crowd in the market, which seemed to comprehend the whole world -the newly oiled boots, (some were actually glossed with blacking,) and the well brushed Sunday coats of the farmers-the dashing gowns and bonnets of the farmers' daughters-the stalls almost broke down with oranges, gingerbread, and other delicacies-the shop windows displaying a dazzling, though fantastic admixture of sugarcandy, ribbons, soap, muslins, and woollen-drapery-the gorgeous signs of the alehouses--the sloops and barges on the canal-the mighty piles of coals and timber-the houses of the gentry, which, from their size, brilliant doors and window-shutters, curious knockers, and a thousand other wonderful things, seemed to be palaces-absolutely overpowered me. I scemed to be some in

sect, which had accidentally crawled into a superior world. I doubted whether it was lawful for me to stare at the shop windows, or to mix myself up with the great folks in the market; and I even deemed it would be sacrilege to tread upon the two or three flag-stones, which were here and there laid before the doors of people of fashion; therefore, whenever I approached them, in my perambulations, I reverently strode into the mire, to avoid them. It would have been scarcely possible, at that time, to have convinced me, that any other place on earth equalled Kiddywinkle.

Although my head is not yet grey, many years have passed over it since that happy moment. I have, in these years, with something of the eccentricity and velocity of the comet, shot across every circle of society, except the upper ones, without appearing to be destined to move in any, and with scarcely a single friendly satellite to accompany me. I have been whirled through lowliness, and ambition, and splendid hopes, and bitter disappointments, and prosperity, and calamity, and everything else, save ease and happiness; until, at last, I have been placed as far out of society, as a man well can be, to live in it at all; and left with scarcely any other employment than that of ruminating on the past, and preparing for the eternity which hangs over me. A long line of years of sleep

lowed every moment. A compact, therefore, constantly exists among the gentlemen, în virtue of which, they never entertain each other, except at that season of universal entertainment, Christmas. Man, however, in spite of pride and poverty, is a social animal. That which is inexorably withheld by scorn of inferiors and limited finances, is abundantly supplied to the aristocracy of Kiddywinkle, by the snug, comfortable, and venerable little parlour of the Nag's Head. Thither they repair every evening of their lives, to regale themselves with a cup of ale, or a glass of brandy and water, as inclination and funds may will; and to taste of joys, less gaudy and exciting, perhaps, than those of costly entertainments, but infinitely more pure and rational.

The Rev. Andrew Smallglebe, Doctor Manydraught, and the three Esquires, Spencer Slenderstave, Leonard Littlesight, and Anthony Ailoften, constituted, a few years since, the tiptop circle of Kiddywinkle, and, of course, they were the sole evening occupants of the little parlour at the Nag's Head. Mr Smallglebe was the vicar, and he enjoyed an income of two hundred and forty-six pounds per annum. He had passed his sixtyseventh year, and was, in person and disposition, the very reverse of those portraits, which mankind are taught to regard as the only correct likenesses of beneficed clergymen. He was in stature considerably below the middle size, and he was exceedingly slender, even in proportion to his limited altitude. His head was, indeed, somewhat larger, his face more round and fleshy, and his shoulders a little broader, than exact symmetry warranted; but then his legs and thighs-they could scarcely stand comparison with a walking-stick. His gait harmonized with the lightness of his form, and was as elastic and nimble as that of the boy of thirteen. The circular, plump, pale face of Mr Smallglebe, did but little justice to his soul. His forehead was reasonably capacious, but still it did not tower into dignity;-his eye was large, but not prominent; steady, but not piercing; dark, but not expressive; perhaps it lost much in effect from displaying an inordinate portion of the white his mouth was wide, and his chin was little, and greatly drawn in. VOL. XV.

The heaviness and vacancy of his countenance were, no doubt, a little heightened by his long, straight, coarse hair; and they were rendered the moré remarkable by the light boyishness of his figure. Mr Smallglebe, however, had many good qualities, and some great ones. His heart was all tenderness and benevolence, but, unfortunately, its bounty streamed as profusely upon the unworthy, as the worthy. He had never mixed with mankind, and he had never been the world's suppliant, or dependent; the few mortals that he had seen had been friends seeking his society, or the needy imploring his assistance, and they, of course, had exhibited to his eyes nothing but desert and virtue. While he had thus seen nothing of mankind's depravity; his spotless conscience and unextinguishable cheerfulness, magnified into the superlative, the little that he had seen of its assumed merit, and he would believe nothing that could be said of it, except praise. In his judgment, the rarest thing in the world was a bad man, or a bad woman; and if the proofs that such existed happened to force themselves upon him, he could always find as many provocatives and palliatives for the guilt, as well nigh sufficed to justify it. He was a man of considerable genius and reading, and, in the pulpit, he was eloquent and popular; but while his pathos melted all before it, and his appeals to the better feelings were irresistible, he never remembered that it was his duty to grapple with the sinner, and to repeat the threatenings to the impenitent. Out of the pulpit, Mr Smallglebe was a universal favourite. His artless, simple, mild, unchangeable, and benevolent cheerfulness spread an atmosphere around him, from which all who entered it drank solace and happiness. His conversation charmed, not by its brilliancy or force; but by its broad, easy flow-its intelligence, warmth, purity, and benevolence. Base as the world is, it was not possible for the man, who was every one's friend, to have an enemy. "He is the best

little man that ever breathed!" was the character which every tongue assigned to Mr Smallglebe. Those who robbed him under the pretence of soliciting charity--those who laughed at his good nature, and credulity-those who despised his profession-and those 3 M

who even forced him into opposition and contention, all joined in ejaculating the eulogy.

Mr Smallglebe, nevertheless, had his failings; these will, perhaps, appear in the course of this history, but I have not the heart to make them the subjects of intentional enumeration. I knew the man, and loved him. Of the multitudes with whom I have come in contact in my eventful life, he was one of the few, whose hearts never could stoop to what men ought to be ashamed of. The recollection of his virtues has stifled the curse on my lips, as in my hours of agony it has been falling on my species. When I look back on the baseness which I have been doomed to witness in human nature, I remember him, and my misanthropy vanishes; for I then know that the world still contains some who are good and honourable. We have parted to meet no more on earth, but I shall only forget him when I leave the world for ever.

Doctor Manydraught had for many years practised as a physician at a neighbouring sea-port, with considerable success. He was a tall, huge, eccentric, boisterous, hot-headed person, whose faculties were of the most diminutive description. Why the outrage was offered to nature, of making a medical practitioner of such a man, instead of a dragon, is a matter too hard for me to explain. How he obtained patients, is not, perhaps, so incomprehensible. Egotism is to most men far more serviceable than merit, although many have not the art, or the nerve, to give it at all times the air of credibility. Doctor Manydraught was a prodigious egotist; and he thundered forth his own praise with such marvellous command of mien-with such triumphant assurance and energythat you found it almost impossible to doubt, or to think that any other physician could safely be trusted. He was never at a loss, and he was never in despair. The patient, sick from excess of health, just affected him as much as the dying one; and the latter could scarcely fail, even at the last hour, of gathering hope from his bold, bright eye, and harsh, dauntless features. The sick, and their friends, therefore, shrunk from the doubting man of skill, to cling to the courageous prescriber, of no skill whatever; and while the former pined from lack of practice, the latter lived riotously up

on a profusion of fees. Doctor Manydraught long led a life, equally busy and merry. He killed unmercifully, and yet never wanted victims; he drank and wenched immoderately, and still the means never ran short. At length, when he reached the fiftieth year of his age, and the seventieth of his constitution, his health failed, his spirits sank, his boasting degenerated into bullying, patients fled, fees vanished, and starvation frowned in the horizon. He acted with his usual decision, and with far more than his usual wisdom. He saw that his loss was irrecoverable, that want was at hand, and he immediately announced his determination to retire from business, converted his little property into an annuity of one hundred and twenty pounds per annum, and settled himself at Kiddywinkle. His change of residence was a masterly piece of policy, for it saved him from a tremendous fall in society; nay, at his new place of abode, notwithstanding his reduction of income, he was a greater man than he was before. All Kiddywinkle eagerly listened to, and devoutly believed his accounts of his wonderful cures his exalted connections-his transcendent merits-and Doctor Manydraught was deemed to be something more than man. He was constantly picking up dinners, half guineas, and even guineas, by means of advice; certain of his old friends were continually sending him hampers of wine, and casks of brandy, and he thus lived almost as sumptuously as

ever.

The father of Spencer Slenderstave, Esquire, converted himself in a brilliant manner, from a washerwoman's bare-footed urchin, into the chief tailor of Kiddywinkle. He amassed wealth, determined that his son should follow some exalted calling, and therefore apprenticed him to the greatest haberdasher in the county. Spencer was tall, sickly, and emaciated as a boy, and he was the same as a man. His constitution and temper were naturally bad, and his ignorant parents rendered them incurable by indulgence. When a child, his frequent fits of illness procured him excessive supplies of barley-sugar, plum-cake, and everything else that his fancy called for; and this not only rendered the fits more frequent, but bribed him to counterfeit them, the more especi