English Jests and Anecdotes

SYDNEY SMITH’S COACH COMPANIONS

On another occasion some years later, when I was going to Brougham Hall, two raw Scotch girls got into the coach in the dark, near Carlisle. “It is very disagreeable getting into a coach in the dark,” exclaimed one, after arranging her band-boxes, “one cannot see one’s company.” “Very true, ma’am, and you have a great loss in not seeing me, for I am a remarkably handsome man.” “No, sir! are you really?” said both. “Yes, and in the flower of my youth.” “What a pity,” said they. We soon passed near a lamp-post; they both darted forward to get a look at me. “Lo, sir, you seem very stout.” “Oh, no, not at all, ma’am, it’s only my great coat.” “Where are you going, sir?” “To Brougham Hall.” “Why, you must be a very remarkable man, to be going to Brougham Hall.” “I am a very remarkable man, ma’am.” At Penrith they got out, after having talked incessantly, and tried every possible means to discover who I was, exclaiming, as they went off laughing, “Well, it is very provoking we can’t see you, but we’ll find out who you are at the hall; Lord Brougham always comes to the ball at Penrith, and we shall certainly be there, and shall soon discover your name.”

A PROOF OF GOOD WINE

A hospitable host in recommending some light wine on the dinner table used the old expression, “There’s not a headache in a bottle of it.” One of his guests, with more truth than politeness, replied, “No, but there’s a belly-ache in every glass of it.”

AN IMPOSTOR

A man of good appearance gave himself out as a lecturer on English literature. Fortified with letters to certain Professors of Trinity College, a small but select audience assembled to hear him. Moore, who was present, among other questions asked him if he was acquainted with “Shenstone’s School Mistress.” He replied, “Yes, but ha’n’t seen her for some time.” In the course of the lecture, he quoted a passage from Lucan, which he said was counted by some critics very “helegant and hingenious,” and which he read as follows: – “The ’evens hintomb, ’im ’oom the hearth does not hinter,” he declared his own opinion that it was neither “helegant nor hingenious.”

THE END

notes

1

It has been said, that the stranger was looking for Lamb’s Conduit Street. This and the following anecdote, together with one or two others, are from an exceedingly amusing work, entitled “The Clubs of London,” published in 1828.

2

Burnett’s History of his Own Times, iii. 1350.

3

The most remarkable thing in this anecdote is certainly the king’s want of good manners, in asking such a question of the representative of a foreign nation.

4

It was from this, perhaps, that Goldsmith took the idea of Garrick’s character in his poem called “Retaliation.”

5

Sir Lumely Skeffington, we believe, is the author alluded to.

6

A celebrated harlequin of the Italian comedy.

7

Bernard’s Retrospections of the Stage.