Another gentle humorist (in the old sense of the word, which is far better than the new) was Dr. John Taylor, Registrar of Cambridge University, editor of Demosthenes and Æschylus, and Canon Residentiary of St. Paul's, who died in 1766. A friend sent to Sylvanus Urban an admirable account of this old scholar, containing a very pleasant picture of his patience with visitors--more than patience, his sweet cordiality. "You have mentioned that Dr. Taylor was too busy a man to be idle. This is too shining a particular in the Doctor's temper and abilities not to be a little more insisted upon. If you called on him in College after dinner, you were sure to find him sitting at an old oval walnut-tree table entirely covered with books, in which, as the common expression runs, he seemed to be buried: you began to make apologies for disturbing a person so well employed; but he immediately told you to advance, taking care to disturb as little as you could the books on the floor; and called out, 'John, John, bring pipes and glasses;' and then fell to procuring a small space for the bottle just to stand on, but which could hardly ever be done without shoving off an equal quantity of the furniture at the other end; and he instantly appeared as cheerful, good-humoured, and _dégagé_, as if he had not been at all engaged or interrupted. Suppose now you had stayed as long as you would, and been entertained by him most agreeably, you took your leave, and got half-way down the stairs; but, recollecting somewhat that you had more to say to him, you go in again; the bottle and glasses were gone, the books had expanded themselves so as to re-occupy the whole table, and he was just as much buried in them as when you first broke in on him. I never knew this convenient faculty to an equal degree in any other scholar." It seems to me that Dr. John Taylor in his study would make a good picture for an artist of interiors. But my favourites among Bowyer's friends are William Clarke, the Sussex parson, and Richard Gough, the antiquary of Enfield. Mr. Gough's particular line was topography, and in addition to a work of his own on the topography of Great Britain, he translated and edited Camden's _Britannia_. Having considerable wealth, he was able to employ illustrators to enrich his text very thoroughly, and when he died he left all his MSS. and drawings to the Bodleian, where they may be seen by the curious to-day. But the trait in the character of this amiable scholar which has most attracted me is his kindness to animals--more than kindness, for any one can feel that, but gratitude too, which found expression in the minute and thoughtful epitaphs which he wrote for the gravestones of his pets. Here is one upon Toby--perhaps a sparrow:-- To immortalise the memory of Merit and Innocence, which, having long since left the abodes of men, shine forth among brutes, and to perpetuate the unhappiness of Favourites, is this monument erected.