Notings, selections,
Anecdote and joke:
Our recollections;
With gravities for graver folk.

* * * * *


THE BAR--THE MASTER OF THE ROLLS.


It must be admitted (talking of the late _Vice_) that he really was
enough to annoy any sober staid master, by his frolics and gambols since
he has been made a judge. I remember him a quiet good sort of man
enough: with a bed-room and kitchen in the area of No. 11, New-square;
and his dining-room above, serving also for consultations: and his
going, now and then, only to have a game of whist and glass of negus at
Serle's;--but, now, he is a perfect _Monsieur Tonson_ to all continental
travellers. Never can you take up the police-book at the hotels, on the
road to Italy, without _Sir John Leach_ staring you in the face. The
other day at the _Cloche_ at Dijon (I will never go there again, and beg
Sir John to do me the favour to withdraw his patronage also,--the _Parc_
is worth twenty of it), yawning over my bottle of _Cote d'Or_, I
inquired of the waiter who of my "land's language" had lately been
there. "Vy, Sare, ve have de Milor Leash." "Lord Leash?"--"Oui,
Monsieur;--mais, Fanchette, apportez le livre ici pour Monsieur--le
voila."--"Ah, ha! Sir John Leach; I see."--"Ah qu'il est bon enfant!
qu'il est gai!" exclaimed the _garcon_. "Ah! qu'il est aimable!" sighed
Fanchette--Enter De Molin the banker's little bureau at Lausanne--(by
the way, it is the favourite chamber of Gibbon the historian, and if you