of the finest hands,” appeared in the witness-box and deposed to what first-rate fellows they all were, and to William Hogarth being a mere mechanic, the last of the lowest, so to speak. But the ready painter was not without friends. He subpœnaed more of the “finest hands.” Up came King, Vanderbank, the opera scene-painter, Laguerre, son and successor to Charles the Second’s Laguerre, and Verrio’s partner, and the serene Thornhill himself, who, I doubt it not, was bidden by my Lord to sit on the bench, was oracular in his evidence as to the young man’s competency, smiled on the chief justice, and revolved in his majestic mind the possibility of the lords of the Treasury giving him a commission (had they the power) to paint the walls and ceilings of all the courts of justice with allegories of Themis, Draco, Solon, Justinian, and Coke upon Lyttleton, to be paid for out of the suitors’ fee fund. We know now how tawdry and trashy these painted allegories were; but Thornhill and Laguerre were really the most reliable authorities to be consulted as to the standard of excellence then accepted in such performances. The verdict very righteously went against the defendant, whose plea was manifestly bad, and Joshua Morris was cast in thirty pounds. I delight to fancy that the successful party straightway adjourned to the Philazers’ Coffee-house, in Old Palace Yard, and there, after a slight refection of hung beef and Burton ale, betook themselves to steady potations of Lisbon wine in magnums—there were prohibitive duties on claret—until each man began to see allegories of his own, in which Bacchus was the capital figure. I delight to fancy that the Anglo-Frenchman Laguerre clapped Hogarth on the back, and told him that he was “von clevare fellow,” and that Sir James shook his young friend by the hand, enjoined him to cultivate a true and proper gusto, and bade him Godspeed. Majestic man! he little thought that when his own celebrity had vanished, or was but as the shadow of the shadow of smoke, his young friend was to be famous to the nations and the glory of his countrymen.[4] For all the handshakings and libations of Lisbon, Sir James was to live to be very angry with his young friend, although the quarrel was to last but a little while. Hogarth had looked upon Thornhill’s daughter Jane, and she was fair, and regarded him, too, with not unfavourable eyes. He who has gained a lawsuit should surely be successful in love. Meanwhile—I don’t think he was much given to sighing or dying—he went on painting, in spite of all the Morrises in upholsterydom. Poor Joshua himself came to grief. He seems to have been bankrupt; and on the 15 th of May, 1729, the auctioneer knocked down to the highest bidder all the choice stock of tapestry in Pall Mall. Hogarth’s _Element of Earth_ may have been “Lot 90;” but one rather inclines to surmise that Morris slashed the fatal canvas with vindictive peissors to shreds and mippets the day his lawyer’s bill came in.