ther
ways. Every sentence of flattery, even to the point of being told that
he is another Cicero, he not only takes seriously, but duly records.

There is an immense amount of snobbery, blatant and unashamed. A certain
Captain Cooke turns out to be a man who had been very great in former
days. Pepys had carried clothes to him when he was a little
insignificant boy serving in his father's workshop. Now Captain Cooke's
fortunes are reversed, and Pepys tells us of his many and careful
attempts to avoid him, and laments his failure in such attempts. He
hates being seen on the shady side of any street of life, and is
particularly sensitive to such company as might seem ridiculous or
beneath his dignity. His brother faints one day while walking with him
in the street, on which his remark is, "turned my head, and he was
fallen down all along upon the ground dead, which did put me into a
great fright; and, to see my brotherly love! I did presently lift him up
from the ground." This last sentence is so delightful that, were it not
for the rest of the Diary, it would be quite incredible in any human
being past the age of short frocks. All this side of his character
culminates in the immense amount of information which we have concerning
his coach. He has great searching of heart as to whether it would be
good policy or bad to purchase it. All that is within him longs to have
a coach of his own, but, on the other hand, he fears the jealousy of his
rivals and the increased demands upon his generosity which such a luxury
may be expected to bring. At last he can resist no longer, and the coach
is purchased. No sooner does he get inside it than he assumes the air of
a gentleman whose ancestors have ridden in coaches since the beginning
of time. "The Park full of coaches, but dusty, and windy, and cold, and
now and then a little dribbling of rain; and what made it worse, there
were so many hackney coaches as spoiled the sight of the gentlemen's."

A somewhat amazing fact in this strange and contradictory character is
the constant element of subtlety which blends with so much frankness. He
wants to do wrong in many different ways but he wants still more to do
it with propriety, and to have some sort of plausible excuse which will
explain it in a respectable light. Nor is it only other people whom he
is bent on deceiving. Were that all, we should have a very simple type
of hypocritical scoundrel, which would be as different as possible f