Chapel lay dangle down its sides like the tags upon Lady Huntingdon’s servants’ shoulders. Now, mind what I say, upon this occasion I wish for a bumper as strenuously as Master Hugh Peters did, when he recommended his congregation in Broadway Chapel to take a second glass.” It is recorded that when he found the sand of his hour-glass had descended, he turned it, saying, “Come, I know you to be jolly dogs, we’ll take t’other glass.”[276] I understand that Rowland Hill is not made up of veneer, but of solid well-seasoned stuff, with a heart of oak, and ever willing to exercise kindness to his fellow-creatures, upon the system of my friend Charles Lamb.[277] [Illustration: ROWLAND HILL “His ideas come red hot from the heart.” _Sheridan_] In May this year I applied to my worthy friend, Mr. John Constable, now a Royal Academician, for any particulars which he might be able to procure respecting Gainsborough, he being also a Suffolk man; and I had the pleasure of receiving the following letter:-- “EAST BERGHOLT, _7th May, 1797_. “_Dear Friend Smith_,--If you remember, in my last I promised to write again soon, and tell you what I could about Gainsborough. I hope you will not think me negligent when I inform you that I have not been able to learn anything of consequence respecting him: I can assure you it is not for the want of asking that I have not been successful, for indeed I have talked with those who knew him. I believe in Ipswich they did not know his value till they lost him. He belonged to something of a musical club in that town, and painted some of their portraits in a picture of a choir; it is said to be very curious. “I heard it was in Colchester; I shall endeavour to see it before I come to town, which will be soon. He was generally the butt of the company, and his wig was to them a fund of amusement, as it was often snatched from his head and thrown about the room, etc.; but enough of this. I shall now give you a few lines verbatim, which my friend Dr. Hamilton, of Ipswich, was so good as to send me; though it amounts to nothing, I am obliged to him for taking the commission.