]
* * * * *
12, Mezza Notte.
Just returned from dinner with Jackson (the Emperor of Pugilism) and
another of the select, at Crib's, the champion's. I drank more than I
like, and have brought away some three bottles of very fair claret--for
I have no headach. We had Tom Crib up after dinner;--very facetious,
though somewhat prolix. He don't like his situation--wants to fight
again--pray Pollux (or Castor, if he was the _miller_) he may! Tom has
been a sailor--a coal-heaver--and some other genteel profession, before
he took to the cestus. Tom has been in action at sea, and is now only
three-and-thirty. A great man! has a wife and a mistress, and
conversations well--bating some sad omissions and misapplications of the
aspirate. Tom is an old friend of mine; I have seen some of his best
battles in my nonage. He is now a publican, and, I fear, a sinner;--for
Mrs. Crib is on alimony, and Tom's daughter lives with the champion.
_This_ Tom told me,--Tom, having an opinion of my morals, passed her off
as a legal spouse. Talking of her, he said, "she was the truest of
women"--from which I immediately inferred she could _not_ be his wife,
and so it turned out.
These panegyrics don't belong to matrimony;--for, if "true," a man don't
think it necessary to say so; and if not, the less he says the better.
Crib is the only man except----, I ever heard harangue upon his wife's
virtue; and I listened to both with great credence and patience, and
stuffed my handkerchief into my mouth, when I found yawning
irresistible--By the by, I am yawning now--so, good night to
thee.
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