But I remember, too, that, when the great judge began to speak, then his mind was (so to speak) streaming out; and he was particularly impatient of inattention or interruption, and particularly non-receptive of anything that might be suggested to him. It is extremely disagreeable, when a vulgar fellow, whom you hardly know, addresses you by your surname with great familiarity of manner. And such a person will take no hint that he is disagreeable, --however stiff, and however formally polite, you may take pains to be to him. It is disagreeable, when persons, with whom you have no desire to be on terms of intimacy, persist in putting many questions to you as to your private concerns,--such as your annual income and expenditure, and the like. No doubt, it is both pleasant and profitable for people who are not rich to compare notes on these matters with some frank and hearty friend whose means and outgoings are much the same as their own. I do not think of such a case,--but of the prying curiosity of persons who have no right to pry, and who, very generally, while diligently prying into your affairs, take special care not to take you into their confidence. Such people, too, while making a pretence of revealing to you all their secrets, will often tell a very small portion of them, and make various statements which you at the time are quite aware are not true. There are not many things more disagreeable than a very stupid and ill-set old woman, who, quite unaware what her opinion is worth, expresses it with entire confidence upon many subjects of which she knows nothing whatever, and as to which she is wholly incapable of judging. And the self-satisfied and confident air with which she settles the most difficult questions, and pronounces unfavorable judgment upon people ten thousand times wiser and better than herself, is an insufferably irritating phenomenon. It is a singular fact, that the people I have in view invariably combine extreme ugliness with spitefulness and self-conceit. Such a person will make particular inquiries of you as to some near relative of your own,--and will add, with a malicious and horribly ugly expression of face, that she is glad to hear how _very much improved_ your relative now is. She will repeat the sentence several times, laying great emphasis and significance upon the _very much improved_. Of course, the notion conveyed to any stranger who may be present is that your relative must in former days have been an extremely bad fellow. The fact probably is, that he has always, man and boy, been particularly well-behaved, and that really you were not aware that he needed any special improvement,--save, indeed, in the sense that every human being might be and ought to be a great deal better than he is.