wered, "I am the Lord Jehovah's servant," and was admitted,
one of the door-keepers saying to the other, "I never heard of that
man's master before, but suppose it is some scurvy Scotch lord or
other."

_New Reading._

Mr. John Kemble used to relate many whimsical anecdotes of provincial
actors whom he knew in the early part of his life. He said that an
actor who was to perform the character of _Kent_ in the play of "King
Lear," had dressed himself like a doctor, with a large grizzle wig,
having a walking-stick, which he held up to his nose, and a box under
his arm. Being asked why he dressed the Earl of Kent in that manner,
he said, "People mistake the character; he was not an earl, but a
doctor. Does not Kent say, when the king draws his sword on him for
speaking in favour of Cordelia, 'Do kill thy _physician_, Lear;' and
when the king tells him to take his 'hated trunk from his dominions,'
and Kent says, 'Now to new climes my old trunk I'll bear,' what could
he mean but his _medicine chest_, to practise in another country?"

_Absence._

The first Lord Lyttleton was very absent in company, and when he fell
into a river, by the oversetting of a boat, at Hagley, it was said of
him that he had "sunk twice before he recollected he could swim." Mr.
Jerningham told me, that dining one day with his lordship, the earl
pointed to a particular dish, and asked to be helped of it, calling
it, however, by a name very different from what the dish contained. A
gentleman was going to tell him of his mistake. "Never mind,"
whispered another of the party; "help him to what he asked for, and he
will suppose it is what he wanted."

Arthur Murphy, whose mind was chiefly occupied by dramatic subjects,
after he became a barrister, dining one Sunday at the chaplain's
table, St. James's Palace, being too early, strolled into the Chapel
Royal during the service, and desiring a seat, he thus addressed one
of the attendants on the pews, "Here, _boxkeeper_, open this _box_."

* * * * *

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.

* * * * *

CURIOUS LAWS RELATING TO CAPS.

In England, in the year 1571, it was enacted, "that every person above
seven years of age should wear on Sundays and holidays a cap of wool,
knit-made, thickened and dressed in England, by some of the trade of
cappers, under the forfeiture of three farthings for every day's
neglect, excepting maids, ladies, and gentlew