o often referred to,
furnish me.

"I liked the Dandies; they were always very civil to _me_, though in
general they disliked literary people, and persecuted and mystified
Madame de Stael, Lewis, * * * *, and the like, damnably. They persuaded
Madame de Stael that A * * had a hundred thousand a year, &c. &c., till
she praised him to his _face_ for his _beauty_! and made a set at him
for * *, and a hundred fooleries besides. The truth is, that, though I
gave up the business early, I had a tinge of dandyism[100] in my
minority, and probably retained enough of it to conciliate the great
ones at five-and-twenty. I had gamed, and drank, and taken my degrees in
most dissipations, and having no pedantry, and not being overbearing, we
ran quietly together. I knew them all more or less, and they made me a
member of Watier's (a superb club at that time), being, I take it, the
only literary man (except _two others_, both men of the world, Moore and
Spenser,) in it. Our masquerade[101] was a grand one; so was the
dandy-ball too, at the Argyle, but _that_ (the latter) was given by the
four chiefs, B., M., A., and P., if I err not.

"I was a member of the Alfred, too, being elected while in Greece. It
was pleasant; a little too sober and literary, and bored with * * and
Sir Francis D'Ivernois; but one met Peel, and Ward, and Valentia, and
many other pleasant or known people; and it was, upon the whole, a
decent resource in a rainy day, in a dearth of parties, or parliament,
or in an empty season.

"I belonged, or belong, to the following clubs or societies:--to the
Alfred; to the Cocoa Tree; to Watier's; to the Union; to Racket's (at
Brighton); to the Pugilistic; to the Owls, or "Fly-by-night;" to the
_Cambridge_ Whig Club; to the Harrow Club, Cambridge; and to one or two
private clubs; to the Hampden (political) Club; and to the Italian
Carbonari, &c. &c., 'though last, _not least_.' I got into all these,
and never stood for any other--at least to my own knowledge. I declined
being proposed to several others, though pressed to stand candidate."

* * * *

"When I met H * * L * *, the gaoler, at Lord Holland's, before he sailed
for St. Helena, the discourse turned upon the battle of Waterloo. I
asked him whether the dispositions of Napoleon were those of a great
general? He answered, disparagingly, 'that they were very simple.' I had
always thought that a degree of simplicity was an ingredient