Esther leaned towards her neighbor, a man of middle age, whose extraordinary plainness of feature rendered him in a way sympathetic and assuring. Of him she inquired the name of the lady who so burned to be her intimate friend. She learned that it was Lady Vereker, one of the most pronounced women of the world of the period. In her turn Lady Vereker hastened to inform Esther in a whisper that her neighbor was Mr. Gibbon, quite an obscure member of Parliament and a commissioner of trade.
"It is said that he has written a great work upon the Romans," added Lady Vereker maliciously, "but to my thinking he does not look capable of it."
In fact, Mr. Gibbon was paying his fair neighbor too assiduous court to please her ladyship.
As no introductions were offered at Reynolds's house, in order to avoid ceremonies of which fashionable persons were more weary than the rest of the world, Esther knew none of the guests, and would have continued in ignorance had not Mr. Gibbon named them; and he accompanied each name with some neat, incisive, mocking little phrase, the secret of which he had learned during his sojourn in France.
"That great solemn figure is Mr. Burke," he explained. "He is vastly eloquent; a huge merit in Parliament, but a sad fault at supper. He shares his solicitude between Miss Burney and his son Richard. He idolizes the boy and never loses sight of him; notice that at this moment his arm is about his neck. He makes it his constant boast that this boy will be a genius. For my part I doubt it. The Phœnix never repeats himself!"
"But who is that strange personage seated on the other side of Miss Burney,—the man with the monstrous head that keeps rolling from shoulder to shoulder, with the twisted and seamed lips, and with eyes both of which are never open at the same moment? Why, his face is a positive grimace! He only succeeds in putting into his mouth half the contents of his plate; and he does not drink, he precipitates the liquid into his throat, and the descending nourishment is in a constant struggle with the ascending words. He disgusts and frightens me, while at the same time he attracts and interests. I am almost tempted to fall in love with him!"
"Brava! There is a portrait which would do credit to our amphitryon. The man is the one whom Chesterfield dubbed the respectable Hottentot; he is the dictator of the republic of letters; in a word, it is Dr. Johnson. That poor man whom you see, with straining eyes and ear bent towards the Doctor, gathering the lightest word which falls from his lips, and who will hand him down to posterity some day, is Boswell, his friend, his fag, and his disciple. The man who is a disciple—a genuine one, I mean—alone has sounded the depths of human folly. Perhaps it is Boswell who has taught Johnson to despise men, and it is Boswell who will teach men to admire Johnson. Now, just beyond Lady Vereker sits Mr. Hanway, whose profile only is visible."
"And who is Mr. Hanway?"
"Very much of a fool in a good sense,—no rare virtue in this isle of ours. He has written upon finance, peace, war, music, ventilation, the poor, Canada; upon military diet, the police, prisons, chimney-sweeps, and God Almighty."