Poor H—— was one of those happy, thoughtless, and imprudent mortals, whose idea of existence lies all in to-day, or to-morrow at farthest,—whose whole life is only a series of random exertions and chance efforts at subsistence—a sort of constant _Maroon war_ with starvation. His life had been altogether passed in Edinburgh. All he knew, besides his professional lore, was of _Edinburgh_; but then he knew _all_ of that. There did not exist a tavern in the capital of which he could not have winked you the characters of both the waiters and the beefsteaks at a moment’s notice. He was at once the annalist of the history, the mobs, the manners, and the jokes of Edinburgh—a human phial, containing its whole essential spirit, corked with wit and labelled with pimples. H—— was a man rich in all sorts of humour and fine sayings. His conversation was dangerously delightful. Had he not unhappily fallen into debauched habits, he possessed abilities that might have entitled him to the most enviable situations about the Court; but, from the nature of his peculiar habits, his wit was the only faculty he ever displayed in its full extent—pity it was the only one that could not be exerted for his own benefit! To have seen him set down “for a night of it” in Lucky F——’s, with a few cronies as _drowthie_ as himself, and his _Shadow_ (a person who shall hereafter be brought to light), was in itself a most exquisite treat. By the time that the injunction of “another half-mutchkin, mistress,” had been six times repeated, his lips, his eyes, and his nose, spoke, looked, and burned wit—pure wit! “He could not ope his mouth, but out there flew a trope.” The very sound of his voice was in itself a waggery; the twinkle of his eye might have toppled a whole theatre over into convulsions. He could not even spit but he was suspected of a witticism, and received the congratulation of a roar accordingly. Nay, at the height of such a tide as this, he would sometimes get the credit of Butler himself for an accidental scratch of his head.