THE INVENTOR OF SANDWICHES.
Once passing a whole day at some game of which he was fond, he became so absorbed in its progress, that he denied himself time to eat, in the usual way, and ordered a slice of beef between two pieces of toasted bread, which he masticated without quitting his game; and that sort of refreshment has ever since borne the designation of a Sandwich. Parkes, in his Musical Memoirs, gives him the credit of
LAPSUS LINGUÆ.
It happened, he says, that during a feast given to his lordship by the Corporation of Worcester, when he was First Lord of the Admiralty, a servant let fall a dish with a boiled neat’s tongue, as he was bringing it to table. The Mayor expressing his concern to his lordship, “Never mind,” said he, “it’s only a lapsus linguæ!” which Witty saying creating a great deal of mirth, one of the Aldermen present, at a dinner he gave soon after, instructed his servant to throw down a roast leg of mutton, that he too might have his joke. This was done; “Never mind,” he exclaimed to his friends, “it’s only a lapsus linguæ.” The company stared, but he begun a roaring laugh, solus. Finding nobody joined therein, he stopped his mirth, saying, that when Lord Sandwich said it, every body laughed, and he saw no reason why they should not laugh at him. This sally had the desired effect, and the company, one and all, actually shook their sides, and our host was satisfied.
OXFORD AND CAMBRIDGE LOYALTY.
In 1717, George I. and his ministers had contrived to make themselves so unpopular, that the badges of the disaffected, oaken boughs, were publicly worn on the 29th of May, and white roses on the birth-day of the Pretender, the 10th of June. Oxford, and especially the university, manifested such strong feelings, that it was deemed expedient to send a military force there: Cambridge, more inclined to the Whig principles of the court and government, was at the same time complimented with a present of books. Upon this occasion, Dr. Trapp, the celebrated Oxford poet and divine, wrote the following epigram:—
Our royal master saw, with heedful eyes,
The wants of his two universities:
Troops he to Oxford sent, as knowing why
That learned body wanted loyalty;
But books to Cambridge gave, as well discerning
How that right loyal body wanted learning.
Cambridge, as may be well supposed, was not backward in retorting: and an able champion she found in her equally celebrated scholar, physician, and benefactor, Sir William Blowne (founder of a scholarship and the three gold medals called after his name,) who replied to Dr. Trapp in the following quaternion:—
The king to Oxford sent a troop of horse,
For Tories know no argument but force:
With equal grace, to Cambridge books he sent,
For Whigs allow no force but argument.