“Ah, sir,” answers the messenger, “how liberal has nature been in bestowing upon you so elegant a pair of lantern jaws! believe me, sir, you will be a lasting honour to the club.”
“My jaws,” says the ugly man in a pet, “are such as nature made them: and Aristotle has asserted, that all her works are beautiful.”
The conversation ends for the present. The deputation leaves the strange gentleman to his reflections, with wishes and hopes that he will consider further.
Another fortnight elapses, and the strange gentleman, presuming the club have forgotten him, employs the time in assuming petit-maître airs, and probably makes advances to young ladies of fortune and beauty. At the expiration of this period, he receives a letter from a pretended female, (contrived by the club,) to the following purport:—
“My dear sir,
“There is such a congeniality between your countenance and mine, that I cannot help thinking you and I were destined for each other. I am unmarried, and have a considerable fortune in pine-barren land, which, with myself, I wish to bestow upon some deserving man; and from seeing you pass several times by my window, I know of no one better entitled to both than yourself. I am now almost two years beyond my grand climacteric, and am four feet four inches in height, rather less in circumference, a little dropsical, have lovely red hair and a fair complexion, and, if the doctor do not deceive me, I may hold out twenty years longer. My nose is, like yours, rather longer than common; but then to compensate, I am universally allowed to have charming eyes. They somewhat incline to each other, but the sun himself looks obliquely in winter, and cheers the earth with his glances. Wait upon me, dear sir, to-morrow evening.
“Yours till death, &c.
“M. M.”
“What does all this mean?” cries the ugly gentleman, “was ever man tormented in this manner! Ugly clubs, ugly women! imps and fiends, all in combination to persecute me, and make my life miserable! I am to be ugly, it seems, whether I will or not.”
At this critical juncture, the president of the club, who is the very pink of ugliness itself, waits upon the strange gentleman, and takes him by the hand. “My dear sir,” says he, “you may as well walk with me to the club as not. Nature has designed you for us, and us for you. We are a set of men who have resolution enough to dare to be ugly; and have long let the world know, that we can pass the evening, and eat and drink together with as much social glee and real good humour as the handsomest of them. Look into this Dutch glass, sir, and be convinced that we cannot do without you.”
“If it must be so, it must,” cries the ugly gentleman, “there seems to be no alternative; I will even do as you say!”