count, so amply, or rather extravagantly, had
they spread their table for that day's feasting.

Though this was meant as an innocent frolic, it was productive of
much mischief to several respectable characters amongst the clergy,
undertakers, sextons, and grave-diggers: they were, it must be
acknowledged, sufferers; for it is a well-known fact, that during
the three months the college was suspended in the air, and therefore
incapable of attending their patients, no deaths happened, except a few
who fell before the scythe of Father Time, and some melancholy objects
who, perhaps to avoid some trifling inconvenience here, laid the hands
of violence upon themselves, and plunged into misery infinitely greater
than that which they hoped by such a rash step to avoid, without a
moment's consideration.

If the apothecaries had not been very active during the above time, half
the undertakers in all probability would have been bankrupts.

CHAPTER XIII

A TRIP TO THE NORTH

_The Baron sails with Captain Phipps, attacks two large bears, and has
a very narrow escape--Gains the confidence of these animals, and then
destroys thousands of them; loads the ship with their hams and skins;
makes presents of the former, and obtains a general invitation to all
city feasts--A dispute between the Captain and the Baron, in which, from
motives of politeness, the Captain is suffered to gain his point--The
Baron declines the offer of a throne, and an empress into the bargain._

We all remember Captain Phipps's (now Lord Mulgrave) last voyage of
discovery to the north. I accompanied the captain, not as an officer,
but as a private friend. When we arrived in a high northern latitude I
was viewing the objects around me with the telescope which I introduced
to your notice in my Gibraltar adventures. I thought I saw two large
white bears in violent action upon a body of ice considerably above the
masts, and about half a league distance. I immediately took my carbine,
slung it across my shoulder, and ascended the ice. When I arrived at
the top, the unevenness of the surface made my approach to those animals
troublesome and hazardous beyond expression: sometimes hideous cavities
opposed me, which I was obliged to spring over; in other parts the
surface was as smooth as a mirror, and I was continually falling: as I
approached near enough to reach them, I found they were only at play. I
immediately began to calculate the value of their skins, for