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vere adepti may be in danger to form rash and hasty conclusions,
especially in some mysterious paragraphs, where certain arcana are
joined for brevity sake, which in the operation must be divided.
And I am certain that future sons of art will return large thanks to
my memory for so grateful, so useful an inmuendo.
It will be no difficult part to persuade the reader that so many
worthy discoveries met with great success in the world; though I may
justly assure him that I have related much the smallest number; my
design having been only to single out such as will be of most
benefit for public imitation, or which best served to give some idea
of the reach and wit of the inventor. And therefore it need not be
wondered if by this time Lord Peter was become exceeding rich. But
alas! he had kept his brain so long and so violently upon the rack,
that at last it shook itself, and began to turn round for a little
ease. In short, what with pride, projects, and knavery, poor Peter
was grown distracted, and conceived the strangest imaginations in
the world. In the height of his fits (as it is usual with those who
run mad out of pride) he would call himself God Almighty, and
sometimes monarch of the universe. I have seen him (says my author)
take three old high-crowned hats, and clap them all on his head,
three storey high, with a huge bunch of keys at his girdle, and an
angling rod in his hand. In which guise, whoever went to take him
by the hand in the way of salutation, Peter with much grace, like a
well-educated spaniel, would present them with his foot, and if they
refused his civility, then he would raise it as high as their chops,
and give them a damned kick on the mouth, which hath ever since been
called a salute. Whoever walked by without paying him their
compliments, having a wonderful strong breath, he would blow their
hats off into the dirt. Meantime his affairs at home went upside
down, and his two brothers had a wretched time, where his first
boutade was to kick both their wives one morning out of doors, and
his own too, and in their stead gave orders to pick up the first
three strollers could be met with in the streets. A while after he
nailed up the cellar door, and would not allow his brothers a drop
of drink to their victuals {95}. Dining one day at an alderman's in
the city, Peter observed him expatiating, after the manner of his
brethren in the praises of his sirloin of beef. "Beef," said the
sage magistrate, "is the king of meat; beef comprehends in it the
quintessence of partridge, and quail, and venison, and pheasant, and
plum-pudding, and custard." When Peter came home, he would needs
take the fancy of cooking up this doctrine into use, and apply the
precept in default of a sirloin to his brown loaf.
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