"At Brighton, I used to make a general postman of the good Marquis of Headfort, who had long been our family's friend, equally at hand to congratulate us on our marriages, our birth-days, or our expected deaths. 'Send all your letters to me at Brighton, under cover to Headfort,' I used to say to everybody who could not frank, or were so cut off from the blessings of this life, as not to have a member belonging to them. Headfort, having a packet of letters to bring up to me every morning from the Pavilion to Prospect-house, which was the dignified appellation my landlord bestowed on my humble cottage at Brighton, I requested he would rap twice only; according to the etiquette observed by other postmen.
"'How much?' one day asked my stupid new servant, for which I discharged her on the spot, for how could one live with an animal so little alive to the sublime and beautiful, as to have mistaken the Marquis of Headfort, wrapped up in an old great coat on a rainy day, for a common general postman! I was really very much shocked indeed.
"'Come upstairs, my dear Marquis,' said I, 'and see me discharge this fool directly.'
"Take off your great coat.
"'Ah! vous voila, Marquis, de haut en bas. Dites, donc, mon cher, en parlant du bas, who do you make love to now? for it cannot be supposed a gay deceiver like yourself can be satisfied with old Mrs. Massey all your life, although that crim. con. affair of yours did cost you so much money.'
"'Oh, my dear child,' answered poor Headfort, 'it is more than ten years since Mrs. Massey has cut me dead, as her lover.'
"'Why?' I asked.
"'Don't you know, my dear, that she has turned methodist, and thinks it wicked.'
"'But then,' said I, 'it is still lucky for you, that her conscience permits her to make use of your house, purse, equipage and private boxes!'
"'Yes,' said Headfort, 'she still does me that honour; for which I pay very dear, particularly on a Sunday, when she reads me Letters from the Dead to the Living, till I am almost tempted to wish her own signature at the bottom of them.'