closely; but, so far as I have been able to comprehend it, the case stands thus :-- In every party at Glasgow, as soon as the punch has levelled the slight barriers of civil ceremony which operate while the cloth remains on the table, the principal amusement of the company consists in the wit of some practised punster, who has been invited chiefly with an eye to this sort of exhibition, (from which circumstance he derives his own nickname of a side-dish,) and who, as a fiddler begins to scrape his strings at the nod of his employer, opens his battery against some inoffensive butt on the opposite side of the table, on a signal, express or implied, from the master of the feast. I say some punster, for puuning seems to be the absolute sine qua non of every Glasgow definition of wit; in whatever way, or on whatever subject, the wit is exerted, it is pretty sure to clothe itself in a garniture of more or less successful calembourgs; and some of the practitioners, I must admit, display very singular skill in their honourable vocation. There are two ways, as I have hinted, in which the punning side-dish may perform the office in behalf of which be has been invited to partake of the less offensive good things that are going on the occasion; and for each of these ways there exists an appropriate and expressive term in the jocular vocabulary of the place. The first is Gagging; it signifies, as its name may lead you to suspect, nothing more than the thrusting of absurdities, wholesale and retail, down the throat of some too-credulous gaper. Whether the Gag come in the shape of a compliment to the Gaggee, some egregious piece of butter, which would at once be rejected by any mouth more sensitive than that for whose well-known swallow it is intended, or some wonderful story, gravely delivered with every circumstance of apparent seriousness, but evidently involving some sheer impossiblity in the eyes of all but the obtuse individual who is made to suck it in with the eagerness of a starved weanling,-or, in whatever other way the Gag may be disguised, the principle of the joke is the same in its essence; and the solemn triumph of the Gagger, and the grim applause of the silent witnesses of his dexterity, are alike visible in their sparkling eyes. A few individuals, particulaly skilled in this elegant exercise, have erected themselves into a club, the sole object of which is its more sedulous and constant cultivation. This club takes the name of "the Gagg College," and I am sorry to tell you some of the very first men in the town( I am told is one) have not disdained to be matriculated in its paltry Album. The seat of this enlightened University is in an obscure tavern or oyster-house; and here its eminent professors may always be found at the appointed hours, engaged in communicating their precious lore to a set of willing disciples, or sharpening their wits in more secret conclave among themselves-sparring as it were in their gloves-giving blows to each other more innocent, no doubt, than those which are reserved for the uninitiated.... The second species is called Trotting-but I have not learned that any peculiar institution has been entirely set apart for its honour and advancement. It is cultivated, however, with eminent industry, at all the common clubs of the place, such as the Banditti, the Dirty-Shirt, the What-you-please, &c. &c. The idea to which its name points, (although somewhat obscurely perhaps you will think,) is that picturesque exhibition of the peculiar properties of a horse, which occurs when the unfortunate individual of that race about to be sold, is made to trot hard upon the rough stones of a Mews-lane, kicking up and showing his paces before the intending purchaser, in presence of a grinning circle of sagacious grooms, jockeys, and black-legs. You have seen such an exhibi tion. You have seen the agent of the proprietor seize the noble Houyhnmn by the white string fastened to his martingale, and urging him by hand and voice, to stretch his nerves and muscles to the cracking point-capering and flinging along as if the devil or the ginger were in him, till smack he comes against the brick wall at the end of the lane, where he is drawn suddenly up-his four extremities with difficulty collecting themselves so as to keep him upright upon the smooth round glossy knobs of granite, over which they have been moving with so much agility. You have seen the poor creature turned right about after the first trot-and compelled, invita Minerva, to a second no less brisk and galling to a third-and to a fourth-while all the time the eyes of those concerned are fix with Argus-like pertinacity on every quiver of his haunches. You have observed, above all, the air of pride and satisfaction, with which the generous animal sometimes goes through the trial-snuffing up the air with his nostrils-heaving his mane—and lashing the wind with his tail-and throwing superfluous vigour into all the ligaments of his frame at every step he takes-little knowing for what mean purposes the exhibition is intended→→ rejoicing with an innocent glee in the very acmé and agony of his degradation. -- Even such is the condition of the poor Glasgow Trottee, upon whom some glorious master of the whip fastens his eye of cruelty, and his hand of guidance. He begins, perhaps, with a slight and careless assent to some unimportant remark, or a moderate response of laughter to some faint feeble joke, uttered by the devoted victim of his art. By degrees the assent becomes warmer, and the laughter louder till at length the good simple man begins to think himself full surely either à wise man or a wit, as the case may be. It is not easy to say in which case the diversion afforded may be the most exquisitely delightful whether it is most pleasing to see a dull man plunging on from depth: to depth of grave drivelling, and finding in the lowest depth a lower still-laying down the law at last with the very pomp of a Lycurgus, on subjects of which he knows not, nor is ever likely to know, anything-his stupid features, with every new dictum of his newly-discovered omniscience, assuming some new addition of imposing solemnity--his forehead gathering wrinkles, and his eye widening in its lack-lustre glimmer as he goes on; it is not easy, I say, to decide whether this exhibition of gravity be more or less delightful, than that of the more frisky and frolicksome Trottee, who is, for the first time in his life, made to imagine himself a wit, and sets about astounding those who gaze upon him by a continually increasing nimbleness, and alacrity of inept levities-pointless puns-and edgeless sarcasms-himself all the while dying with laughter at the conceptions of his own wonder-working fancy-first and loudest in the cachinnation which is at once the reward and punishment of his folly. I must own that the evil principle was strong enough within me to make me witness the first two or three exhibitions of this sort of festivity with not a little satisfaction-I smiled, instigante plane Diabolo, and not having the fear of the like before my eyes. On an after occasion, however, one of the most formidable of the practitioners thought fit to attempt making Dr. Morris his butt, and I believe he did absolutely succeed in trotting me a few yards to and fro on the subject of the shandrydan. But I perceived what was going forward in good time, and watching my opportunity, transferred with infinite dexterity the bit from my own mouth to that of my trotter--aye, and made him grind it till I believe his gums were raw. I had the good sense, however, to perceive the danger of the practice in spite of my own successful debut, and, God willing, from this moment, hope never to fill the roll either of Trotter or Trottee. The ideas you will form of the style of society which prevails in this place, from these little data, cannot indeed be very high ones. Beware, however, of supposing that to faults of so detestable a nature, there are no exceptions. I have already met with many-very many-well-bred gentlemen in Glasgow, who neither trot nor are trotted—who never were so stupid as to utter a pun-nor so malicious as to invent or echo a nick-name. It is true, indeed, that they are the nigro simillimi cygno of the place; but their rarity only renders them the more admirable, and the less deserving of being crowded into the list of evil-doers, with whom they are continually surrounded. P. M. LETTER LXXII. TO THE SAME. * AFTER all, I am inclined to think that the manners of mercantile men are by no means so disagreeable as those of men engaged in most other active professions. In the manners of Glasgow, it is true, there is a sad uniformity of mercantile peculiarities; but how could this be otherwise in a town where no nobility resides, and where there is no profession that brings the aristocracy of talent much into view? In such a town, it is obvious there must be a miserable defect in the mechanism of society, from there being nothing to counteract the overbearing influence of mere wealth, or to preserve the remembrance of any other species of distinction. In a society where individuals claim importance on many different grounds, there must, of course, be produced an extension of thought, corresponding to the different elements which these individuals contribute to the general mass. But here, no doubt, the cup below is a dead one, and the one gilded drop floats alone and lazily upon the heavy surface. Yet, taking matters as they are, perhaps the influence of the mercantile profession, although bad enough when thus exclusively predominant, is not, in itself, one of the worst. If this profession does not necessarily tend to refine or enlighten human nature, it at least does not distort it into any of those pedantries connected with professions which turn altogether upon the successful exercises of a single talent. The nature of the merchant is left almost entirely free, and he may enter into any range of feelings he pleases-but it is true he commonly saves himself the trouble of doing so, and feels only for NUMBER ONE. In Glasgow, however, it would seem that the mercantile body is graced with a very large number of individuals, who are distinguished by a very uncommon measure of liberality |