ABSTRACT

In a society, instituted for the purpose of amicable disputation, to which I once found means to obtain admittance, the following question was proposed for discussion:—‘Which circumstances would be more irk-some to a gentleman of delicate feelings; the reflection that he had killed another in a duel, or had been himself pulled by the nose from Penzance in Cornwall to our town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, by way of London.’ That his audience might have as clear a comprehension as possible of the subject to be discussed, the leader of the debate thought it necessary to specify to them the distance between the two places mentioned, in which his accuracy was questioned by a gentleman with his handkerchief under his wig. The contest was carried on with violence and acrimony, but was at length somewhat appeased by means of a third person, who, upon bringing the parties to explain, discovered that they had made their calculations upon different principles, the one having consulted Paterson’s book of roads, the other, Ogilby’s.2