THE GOLDSMITH AND THE TAILOR.
An elderly goldsmith of rather choleric temperament, though well to do in the world, was brought before the magistrate on a warrant, wherein he was charged with having perpetrated an assault and battery on the person of one Mr. John Carpue, a student in tailory, or "a tailor's apprentice," as the ancients used to say. And this was the manner of it:—
The goldsmith was indebted to a celebrated professor of tailory in the vicinity of Bond-street, for sundry exquisitely-cut garments, furnished to him as per order. This account had been kept open so long, that latterly, it had become "somewhat musty"—just as a jar of any other preserves would do if kept open too long; and therefore the professor sent one of his junior students to the goldsmith, requesting it might be closed—in plain terms, he wished to have the "tippery" for his "toggery." The goldsmith took the request angrily; and instead of sending the junior student back with the money in his pocket, he sent him back with "a flea in his ear." The professor thought this conduct extremely rude and ungoldsmithlike; and after two or three days' cogitation he sent his senior student, Mr. John Carpue, with a more peremptory message. The senior student went, saw the goldsmith, delivered the professor's message, and paused for a reply. The goldsmith lowered angrily upon him, as he had done upon the other, and ejaculated something about "confounded coxcombs." The tailor "saw his anger rise—his glowing cheeks and ardent eyes," but, instead of succumbing to his choler, he stood his ground firmly; and boldly repeated his message with a few aggravatory flourishes of his own; whereupon, the goldsmith, not having the fear of the Quarter Sessions before his eyes, seized the tailor-student by his cutting-arm, and ejected him from the room; at the same time endeavouring to shut the door upon him. "I ar'n't to be bundled off without the money in this manner," exclaimed the student. "If you don't go along, I'll break your neck downstairs!" exclaimed the goldsmith. The tailor contumaciously set his back against the door to prevent its closing; the goldsmith tried with all his might to close it; the tailor squeaked out his anger; the goldsmith grunted out his indignation; the door creaked and strained between them; and in all probability it would have been forced off its hinges, and, perhaps, totally spoiled for ever, if the goldsmith had not, with great presence of mind, popped his fist through the opening, right into the tailor's masticatory apparatus. The tailor fell; the door was closed; the goldsmith returned quietly to his seat; and then the tailor—having gathered himself up, and shrieked a parting malediction through the key-hole—went back to Bond-street, quite discomfited.
This was the assault and battery complained of; and the goldsmith, in his defence, said the tailor refused to leave his house when he told him, and upon his attempting to show him the door, the young buckramite rudely seized him by the collar; which rudeness he returned of course.
The magistrate held the assault justifiable under such circumstances, and so the poor "student in tailory" was non-suited.