invited they are aware that it is a kind of republican meeting--You
understand me--a meeting of the republic of letters, and that they must
expect nothing but plain substantial fare."

These hints enabled me to comprehend more fully the arrangement of the
table. The two ends were occupied by two partners of the house. And the
host seemed to have adopted Addison's ideas as to the literary
precedence of his guests. A popular poet had the post of honor,
opposite to whom was a hot-pressed traveller in quarto, with plates. A
grave-looking antiquarian, who had produced several solid works, which
were much quoted and little read, was treated with great respect, and
seated next to a neat, dressy gentleman in black, who had written a
thin, genteel, hot-pressed octavo on political economy that was getting
into fashion. Several three-volume duodecimo men of fair currency were
placed about the centre of the table; while the lower end was taken up
with small poets, translators, and authors, who had not as yet risen
into much notice.

The conversation during dinner was by fits and starts; breaking out
here and there in various parts of the table in small flashes, and
ending in smoke. The poet, who had the confidence of a man on good
terms with the world and independent of his bookseller, was very gay
and brilliant, and said many clever things, which set the partner next
him, in a roar, and delighted all the company. The other partner,
however, maintained his sedateness, and kept carving on, with the air
of a thorough man of business, intent upon the occupation of the
moment. His gravity was explained to me by my friend Buckthorne. He
informed me that the concerns of the house were admirably distributed
among the partners. "Thus, for instance," said he, "the grave gentleman
is the carving partner who attends to the joints, and the other is the