ed in his presence, that set light-minded hearers in a roar, it
was observed to throw him into a state of perplexity. Sometimes he
would deign to inquire into the matter, and when, after much
explanation, the joke was made as plain as a pikestaff, he would
continue to smoke his pipe in silence, and at length, knocking out
the ashes, would exclaim, 'Well! I see nothing in all that to laugh
about.'

"With all his reflective habits, he never made up his mind on a
subject. His adherents accounted for this by the astonishing
magnitude of his ideas. He conceived every subject on so grand a
scale that he had not room in his head to turn it over and examine
both sides of it. Certain it is, that, if any matter were
propounded to him on which ordinary mortals would rashly determine
at first glance, he would put on a vague, mysterious look, shake his
capacious head, smoke some time in profound silence, and at length
observe, that 'he had his doubts about the matter;' which gained him
the reputation of a man slow of belief and not easily imposed upon.
What is more, it has gained him a lasting name; for to this habit of
the mind has been attributed his surname of Twiller; which is said
to be a corruption of the original Twijfler, or, in plain English,
Doubter.

"The person of this illustrious old gentleman was formed and
proportioned, as though it had been moulded by the hands of some
cunning Dutch statuary, as a model of majesty and lordly grandeur.
He was exactly five feet six inches in height, and six feet five
inches in circumference. His head was a perfect sphere, and of such
stupendous dimensions, that dame Nature, with all her sex's
ingenuity, would have been puzzled to construct a neck capable of
supporting it; wherefore she wisely declined the attempt, and
settled it firmly on the top of his backbone, just between the
shoulders. His body was oblong and particularly capacious at
bottom; which was wisely ordered by Providence, seeing that he was a
man of sedentary habits, and very averse to the idle labor of
walking. His legs were short, but sturdy in proportion to the
weight they had to sustain; so that when erect he had not a little
the appearance of a beer-barrel on skids. His face, that infallible
index of the mind, presented a vast expanse, un