HISTORICAL PROBLEM: "Is Gentleman Waife a swindler or a man of
genius?" ANSWER: "Certainly a swindler, if he don't succeed."
Julius Caesar owed two millions when he risked the experiment of
being general in Gaul. If Julius Caesar had not lived to cross the
Rubicon and pay off his debts, what would his creditors have called
Julius Caesar?

I need not say that Mr. Hartopp and his foreman came duly to tea, but the
Comedian exhibited Sir Isaac's talents very sparingly,--just enough to
excite admiration without sating curiosity. Sophy, whose pretty face and
well-bred air were not unappreciated, was dismissed early to bed by a
sign from her grandfather, and the Comedian then exerted his powers to
entertain his visitors, so that even Sir Isaac was soon forgotten. Hard
task, by writing, to convey a fair idea of this singular vagrant's
pleasant vein. It was not so much what he said as the way of saying it,
which gave to his desultory talk the charm of humour. He had certainly
seen an immense deal of life somehow or other; and without appearing at
the time to profit much by observation, without perhaps being himself
conscious that he did profit, there was something in the very
/enfantillage/ of his loosest prattle, by which, with a glance of the
one lustrous eye and a twist of the mobile lip, he could convey the
impression of an original genius playing with this round world of ours--
tossing it up, catching it again--easily as a child plays with its party-
coloured ball. His mere book-knowledge was not much to boast of, though
early in life he must have received a fair education. He had a
smattering of the ancient classics, sufficient, perhaps, to startle
the unlearned. If he had not read them, he had read about them; and at
various odds and ends of his life he had picked up acquaintance with the
popular standard modern writers. But literature with him was the
smallest stripe in the party-coloured ball. Still it was astonishing how