Matter so commonplace needs but a passing glance, and there
an end.
The despisers of mankind--apart from the mere fools and mimics, of that
creed--are of two sorts. They who believe their merit neglected and
unappreciated, make up one class; they who receive adulation and
flattery, knowing their own worthlessness, compose the other. Be sure
that the coldest-hearted misanthropes are ever of this last order.
Mr Chester sat up in bed next morning, sipping his coffee, and
remembering with a kind of contemptuous satisfaction how he had shone
last night, and how he had been caressed and courted, when his servant
brought in a very small scrap of dirty paper, tightly sealed in two
places, on the inside whereof was inscribed in pretty large text these
words: 'A friend. Desiring of a conference. Immediate. Private. Burn it
when you've read it.'
'Where in the name of the Gunpowder Plot did you pick up this?' said his
master.
It was given him by a person then waiting at the door, the man replied.
'With a cloak and dagger?' said Mr Chester.
With nothing more threatening about him, it appeared, than a leather
apron and a dirty face. 'Let him come in.' In he came--Mr Tappertit;
with his hair still on end, and a great lock in his hand, which he put
down on the floor in the middle of the chamber as if he were about to go
through some performances in which it was a necessary agent.
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