"Glasses Round."

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ONE of the commonest infirmities of poor human nature is the desire of notoriety however short lived, and the love of applause and flattery, however hollow and insincere. This tendency makes itself apparent more or less broadly in every walk of life. Kings and Emperors will be found sometimes bidding for popularity, by means legitimate or otherwise, either by tricks of intrigue or by liberal and broad diplomacy. Statesmen are not always above seeking to secure to themselves the cheer of tizanship by lending their influence to "jobs" sometimes too dirty for the proper dignity of their office. A subtle state minister will feel the pulse of the religious world before he makes any ecclesiastical appointment, and on the first vacant bishopric offering itself he will pop in the man whom he thinks would be the choice of the great body of the people, and not always the right man for the right place, whose appointment would be most benefitting to the church generally, or the diocese to which he has been preferred in particular. When the millenium comes there will be no drunkards, no thieves, no pickpockets, and no

bishops; but in the meantime, pending the conclusion of the Rev. Dr. Cumming's arrangements with the Deity, whose head clerk he appears to regard himself, we shall be obliged to contend with these impediments and obstructions to pure and undefiled religion, and the pothouse bench and the episcopal bench will continue to be filled. But, coming further down the ladder, we find other people wishing for this notoriety of which I have spoken, according to the means which their sphere of life affords. Of course the lawyer does it to any extent. Who ever believed in the politics of a lawyer? Who ever believed a lawyer had any politics at all? But we have lawyers jostling about amongst constituencies-and carefully balancing the chances of going in for whig or tory interest, and invariably choosing that course which, in their opinion, is the shortest cut to the attorney-generalship or the woolsack. The merchant tries it on in any way he deems the most available, and works his way through champagne dinners, and volunteer bugle presentations, to the bench of aldermen or to the civic chair. The tailor, the boot and shoe-maker, the grocer and teadealer, and all the toiling knights of the counter and the apron and the sleeve-board, are fond of distinction of some kind; and once every twelve months we find the horses in the streets shying at huge coloured bills, headed "Calumny," " Falsehood," "Corruption," "Intimidation," &c., &c., and when we go to read who the calumniator, and traducer, and all the rest of it is, we find out that it is the little harmless-looking, mild-eyed barber, who shaved us the day before yesterday, or the inoffensive cheese-factor, who was so scrupulously strict in giving us our exact weight of double Gloucester, and who actually took an entire fourpenny piece off our quarter's bill. We can't believe it-What! That noble, generous soul, whose scales are equity itself, and whose apron is the symbol of purity, he a defamer, an intriguer, a perjurer. Impossible! A man who can knock off fourpence from his bill, and actually say "thank you"

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for the rest; it is some atrocious libel put forth by false detractors. It is not to be believed. Upon that barber's brow—that easy-shaving man- "shame is ashamed to sit;" into that grocer's eye no gleam of malice ever could have shot-within the waistcoat of that noble scissor-king, no thimble-rigging thoughts could find a lodgment; you advance to read the indictment, and discover that all this abuse arises from this human weakness of love of popularity, for these worthy gentry have been o'er-vaulting the counter for the nonce, and having a race towards the goal of the City Council, and it is part of the etiquette of the ceremony to abuse each other as much as possible till the race is r

But not only do we see this weakness in the pursuit of the recognised objects of ambition, not only is it perceptible when there is a tangible goal in view, but it is also shewn when a passing hurrah, or a momentary bravo is the entire and the sole result. A glance of admiration or of wonder, even though it continue for a moment, and no matter from whose eye it comes, is deemed by some people worthy of hours of trouble and attention, to command. But for this, why does that gentleman with the low forehead and the flaxen hair, spend so much time in the arrangement of his toilette? Why does he squeeze his feet into boots so small that his toes are tied up in a bunch, and can scarcely be distinguished from each other? Why does he pass two hours beneath the greasy fingers of the hair-dresser, and train his whiskers like the apple-trees in a gentleman's garden? Why does he go to Mr. Statham's riding-school, to hire the lankest looking horse upon the place, spending his last halfsovereign in the transaction, and then set off ambling along Oxford-Road with a "weed" in his mouth, for nursery-maids to gaze upon, as they trundle the perambulator load of babies against the shins of the passengers? If this be not so, why does the wife of a half-desperate man of business, in bad times like these, run up a ruinous account at the milliners, for skirts and

flounces, and bonnets, to be changed with every hour of the day? Is it not simply that her neighbour Mrs. Grundy may be driven half-mad with jealousy, as she sees her "spoon-bonnet" with its tuft of red poppies at the top, and sticking up like the vane or coop upon the top of a livery stable? Is it not that some still poorer neighbour may half ruin her husband in her envious emulation, by adorning herself and her four comely daughters on the same scale of magnificence and expense? In every walk of life we find this tendency, the lowest as well as the highest. There are some people, who, go where they will, are determined to become the heroes of the hour. It is seen, perhaps, as strikingly as anywhere else, upon a small scale, in the bar-room, snuggery, free-and-easy world. The habitues of these places are always vieing with each other for the ascendancy. Those with most wit and least cash, try to command attention by the volubility of their slang, and the smartness of their Billingsgate. But there is no way to pot-house fame and adulation more short and sure, than by going through that interesting little formality which has formed the motto of this address, viz., standing "glasses round." The man who does this, is sure to be elected president, and to be invested with the hammer of authority. But it is just possible, though hardly probable in a cultivated assembly like the present, that there may be some benighted and unfortunate ignoramus, who may not know what is meant by "standing glasses round." Apologizing to the initiated body of my hearers for pausing to explain such an obvious matter, let me just condescend to the ignorance of the uneducated for a moment, and give them a simple definition of the phrase. "Standing glasses round" is nothing more nor less than ringing the bell, and after politely enquiring of every gentleman present, what beverage he would most prefer-commanding the waiter to fill all the glasses according to order—with brandy and water, gin and bitters, whisky toddy, or negus, as the case may be. Should there be any member of the company already too much intoxicated to explain what he

wants, it will become the duty of the benevolent individual who stands glasses round, to decide for him, and according to taproom etiquette, to order a magnum of extra strength in order to revive the invalid. According to the enlightened rules of such societies, there is no such thing as a man being drunk. Should any member of the association grow incoherent in his talk, very thick in his speech, or unsteady in his seat, he is to be regarded as unwell, and a further stimulant is to be prescribed as the only means of recovery. The man who suggested cold water, or open air, or a wet towel, or bed, would be regarded as an essentially vulgar-minded person, quite unfit for so aristocratic a circle. The words "glasses round" are regarded as the motto of good-fellowship, and the man who is the first to suggest a suspension of this circulation of the glass is set down as a narrowminded, mean-spirited wretch, or else as a poor, pitiable, unseasoned greenhorn, who has not learned to keep pace with the times. There is a perfect Encyclopædia Taproomia of selfcomplacency bound up in the tone of voice and air with which some men with double chins can issue the command of "Waiter! glasses round!" The utterer of this oracular mandate is generally a man of a peculiar type. Not only is he adorned with the ornament already alluded to-to wit, a double chin, so red that you can scarcely discern it from the scarlet belcher round the neck, but he has also a round knobby nose, buried between two huge mountainous cheeks, very much like a lady's emery pincushion with which she cleans her needles. He sits a good way from the table-not from inclination, but from necessity to make room for his which are decidedly voluminous. chair he seems so "fixed in his incredible how he ever gets out of it. in the faintest gesture of his hand before he speaks he will vanish from the room with a profes

waistcoat and its contents, When once ensconced in his everlasting seat" that it is The waiter can read his will or glance of his eye, and