"THE POMPOUS IDIOT."
Reader! it is not Samuel Johnson, nor his Leader Bozzie. These were both pompous enough, God knows; but they were not idiots—it is "my Uncle Thomas." My Uncle Thomas was once a colonel in the Galloway Militia, and has long retired in single blessedness, to live upon a small family inheritance, which is scarcely sufficient to support himself, with a man in livery and a servant girl, to work his means, and act as chambermaid. My uncle rises every morning at seven, rings his bell, and calls his servant to shave and dress him. All this is done in solemn silence; for it would be presumption in John to utter a word, unless he be spoken to. My uncle, having surveyed his full, round person in the glass, takes possession of his arm-chair, then pokers the fire; looks out at his window; scolds a turkey-cock for spreading his feathers and keeping up a row in the back court; rings the bell again, and says—
"Why, sir, what do you stare at? Let me have breakfast."
Breakfast with my uncle is a serious concern. The cups are not in order; the bread is burned to a cinder; the butter is rancid, and the cream is only fit to feed pigs with. However, he has at last breakfasted, and been again surveyed and brushed by John, and is now prepared for the onerous duties of the day. These consist, first, in taking snuff, which he does regularly with three raps on the box-lid, a gaze around, to see if he is observed, and a knowing plunge of the forefinger and thumb into the midst of the powder. But his box is empty, though in fact half-full, and John, having been well scolded, is despatched to his own shop, Donald Mackechnie's, for the real Irish. The box is impressed with the family arms, and the family motto, "dum vivo spero." At last the supply arrives; his gold-headed cane, presented to him when colonel of the Galloway Militia, is taken in hand; his hat is brushed, and planted in proper attitude on his head; and forth he sallies, in his pepper-and-salt habiliments, to scold the schoolboys for neglecting to take off, or even touch, their hats, as he passes along what he terms his gravel-walk, which is nothing more nor less than a cart-road leading to a stone-quarry. A cow has escaped from under the care of his keeper, and poor Davie Proudfoot, the herd-boy, is in hot pursuit. The cow is directing her steps, somewhat unceremoniously, towards the colonel's favourite walk, and he is loudly appealed to by the boy, to assist him in "wearing" the brute. My uncle stares with ineffable rage and contempt upon the unfortunate tender of cattle.
"What, sir!—what mean you, sir, to ask a colonel in His Majesty's service to turn a cow?"
My uncle has gone, in quest of an appetite, beyond his usual bounds, and having observed a person passing over the grounds of a neighbouring laird, with a gun under his arm, and of a questionable appearance, he determines to inform Lord Douglas, the neighbouring laird, as he usually designates his lordship, of the fact; and for this purpose, in order to receive information, he calls at the door of a cottage. A little girl, about ten years of age, makes her appearance, and is accosted with—
"Lassie, where is your mother?"
"Mither, oh, mither—she's butt the house; but what do you want wi' her?"
"You are an ill-educated girl," says my uncle. "Why don't you say 'sir' to me when you address me? But go and tell your mother to speak to me—away!"
"Mither! mither! haste and come here—there's a man wantin to speak to you."
This was more than my uncle could stand: so he instantly decamped, gold-headed cane and all, to ruminate over the indignities to which he had been subjected.
"Go," said he one day to John, when acting as butler to the colonel, his master, and the young laird of Puddentuscal, who had been invited to dinner—"go to catacomb seventeen, and bring us a bottle of vintage twenty-six."
"Catacomb here, and vintage there," replied John, with a comical expression on his face, "that's the last bottle on the table I've got frae Peter Cruikshanks, for the twa cheeses we selt him."
My uncle died one day, but had taken previous care to have himself carried shoulder-high to the grave. "Sic transit gloria mundi!"
"Miss Smiles! Oh, Miss Smiles, I am happy to see you, you have been such a stranger! But how is your mother? I was sorry to hear of her late dangerous indisposition, and that you were obliged to call in the assistance of a doctor."
"Oh yes," replies