Some of the most pleasant pictures in the "Journal to Stella" are those in which the kindly presence of the Doctor softens the asperity of the Dean. Most readers of these pages have accompanied the two "brothers" in their excursion to the course the day before the horse-races, when they overtook Miss Forrester, the pretty maid of honour, and made her accompany them. The lady was taking the air on her palfrey, habited in the piquant riding-dress of the period--the natty three-cornered cocked hat, ornamented with gold lace, and perched on the top of a long flowing periwig, powdered to the whiteness of snow, the long coat cut like a coachman's, the waistcoat flapped and faced, and lastly the habit-skirt. One sees the belle at this time smiling archly, with all the power of beauty, and shaking the handle of her whip at the divine and the physician. So they took her with them (and they weren't wrong in doing so). Then the old Queen came by, gouty and hypochondriac. Off went the hats of the two courtiers in the presence of her Majesty. The beauty, too, raised her little three-cornered cock-boat (rising on her stirrup as she did so), and returned it to the summit of the flowing wig, with a knowing side-glance, as much as to say, "See, sirs, we women can do that sort of thing quite as gracefully as the lords of the creation." (Oh, Mr. Spectator, how could you find it in you to quarrel with that costume?) Swift was charmed, and described enough of the scene to make that foolish Stella frantically jealous; and then, prudent, canny love-tyrant that he was, added with a sneer--"I did not like her, though she be a toast, and was dressed like a man." And you may be sure that poor little Stella was both fool enough and wise enough both to believe and disbelieve this assurance at the same time. Arbuthnot owed his success in no degree whatever to the influence of his family, and only in a very slight degree to his professional knowledge. His father was only a poor episcopalian clergyman, and his M.D. degree was only an Aberdeen one. He rose by his wit, rare conversational powers, and fascinating address, achieving eminence at Court because he was the greatest master of fence with the weapon that is most used in courts--the tongue. He failed to get a living amongst rustic boors, who appreciated no effort of the human voice but a fox-hunter's whoop. Dorchester, where as a young man he endeavoured to establish himself in practice, refused to give him an income, but it doubtless maintained more than one dull empiric in opulence. In London he met with a different reception. For a time he was very poor, and resorted to the most hateful of all occupations--the personal instruction of the ignorant. How long he was so engaged is uncertain. Something of Goldsmith's "Peckham" sensibility made him not care in after-life to talk of the days when he was a teacher of mathematics--starving on pupils until he should be permitted to grow fat on patients.