his man I was continually measuring my strength; and as I
conceived that I found, myself woefully wanting, he proved an excellent
moral sedative to my else too rampant vanity. Few, indeed, were the
persons who could feel themselves at ease under the withering sarcasms
of his intolerable insolence. Much more to their astonishment than to
their instruction, he would very coolly, and the more especially when
ladies were present, correct the divinity of the parson, the pharmacy of
the doctor, and the law of the attorney; and with that placid air of
infallibility that carried conviction to all but his opponents.

Once, at a very large evening party, I heard him arguing strenuously,
and very triumphantly, against a veteran captain of a merchant-ship, who
had circumnavigated the world with Cook, that the degrees of longitude
were equal in length all over the world, be they more or less--for he
never descended to details--and that the further south you sailed the
hotter it grew, though the worthy old seaman pointed to what remained of
his nose, the end of which had been nipped off by cold, and consequent
mortification, in the anti-arctic regions. As Riprapton flourished his
wooden index, in the midst of his brilliant peroration, he told the
honest seaman that he had not a _leg_ to stand upon; and all the ladies,
and some of the gentlemen, too, cried out with one accord, "O fie,
Captain Headman, now don't be so obstinate--surely you are quite
mistaken." And the arch-master of impudence looked round with modest
suavity, and, in an audible whisper, assured the gentleman that sat next
to him, that Captain Headman's argument of the demolished proboscis went
for nothing, for that there were other causes equally efficacious as
cold and frost, for destroying gentlemen's noses.

In the sequel, this very learned tutor had to instruct me in navigation.
Nothing was too high or too low for him. Had any persons wished to
have taken lessons in judicial astrology, Mr Riprapton would not have
refused the pupil. Plausible ignorance will always beat awkward
knowledge, when the ignorant, which is generally the case, make up the
mass of the audience.

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

TREATETH OF THE AMATIVENESS OF WOODEN MEMBERS, AND THE FOLLY OF VIRGIN
FRIGHTS--RALPH PUTTETH HIS THREAT OF VERSIFYING INTO ACTUAL EXECUTION,
FOR WHICH HE MAY BE THOUGHT WORTHY OF BEING EXECUTED.

Notwithstanding the superciliousness of my friendly assistant, I still