"Politics and religion are very well, but he is a detestable pedant, and his head is a lumber-garret of Greek quotations, which he raps out as a juggler does ribbands at a country fair."
And speaking of "Chuckle Bennet," he calls him in a note,
"A good calf-headed bookseller in Pall Mall, the intimate confidant and crony of little M*th**s, and who, upon Owen's bankruptcy, published Part IV. of Pursuits of Literature himself."
Of Owen, who published Part I., our author says:
"Hither the sly little fellow got crony Becket to send his satirical trumpery;"
which is further explained in the following note:
"Becket's back door is in an alley close to his house; here have I often seen little M*th**s jog in and sit upon thorns for fear of being seen, in the back-parlour, chattering matters over with old Numscull. After passing through many hands, the proof sheets at last very slily reached little M*th**s that he might revise the learned lumber."
After alluding to several pieces published by Mathias, our unmerciful critic adds in another note:
"It is very remarkable how strongly the characteristic features of identity of authorship are marked in these several pieces; the little man had not even the wit to print them in a different manner, yet strange to tell, few, very few, could smell the he-goat!