description 'could have convinced him of so peculiar an instance of
genius,' and so forth.

One of his most extraordinary efforts in this line is related by Mr.
Jerdan. A dinner was given by Mansell Reynolds to Lockhart, Luttrell,
Coleridge, Hook, Tom Hill, and others. The grown-up schoolboys, pretty
far gone in Falernian, of a home-made, and very homely vintage, amused
themselves by breaking the wine-glasses, till Coleridge was set to
demolish the last of them with a fork thrown at it from the side of the
table. Let it not be supposed that any teetotal spirit suggested this
inconoclasm, far from it--the glasses were too small, and the poets, the
wits, the punsters, the jesters, preferred to drink their port out of
tumblers. After dinner Hook gave one of his songs which satirized
successively, and successfully, each person present. He was then
challenged to improvise on any given subject, and by way of one as far
distant from poetry as could be, _cocoa-nut oil_ was fixed upon.
Theodore accepted the challenge; and after a moment's consideration
began his lay with a description of the Mauritius, which he knew so
well, the negroes dancing round the cocoa-nut tree, the process of
extracting the oil, and so forth, all in excellent rhyme and rhythm, if
not actual poetry. Then came the voyage to England, hits at the Italian
warehousemen, and so on, till the oil is brought into the very lamp
before them in that very room, to show them with the light it feeds and
make them able to break wine-glasses and get drunk from tumblers. This
we may be sure Hook himself did, for one, and the rest were probably not
much behind him.

In late life this gift of Hook's--improvising I mean, not getting
intoxicated--was his highest recommendation in society, and at the same
time his bane. Like Sheridan, he was ruined by his wonderful natural