_O’Dogh._ Ogh, I have been among them already, and I know them all very well. What signifies my sitting among hundreds of people with my single opinion all alone. When I was there before I was stigmatized as a singular blockhead, an impracticable fellow, only because I would not consent to sit like an image, and when the master of the puppets pulled the string of my jaw on one side, to say aye, and on t’other side, to say no, and to leap over a stick backwards and forwards, just as the faction of party and jobbers, and leaders, and political adventurers directed--ah, brother, brother, I have done with them all--oh, I have done with them all. _Coun._ What, and after all your expence of opposing government right or wrong, and supporting your patriots, will you give them all up? _O’Dogh._ Indeed I will--I was patriot mad I own, like a great many other fools in this distracted country--sir, I was so mad that I hated the very name of a courtier as much as an illiterate lay-swaddling methodist does that of a regular clergyman. But I am cured of that folly; for now I find that a courtier is just as honest a man as a patriot--my dear, they are both made of the same stuff; ah, I have at last found out what sort of an animal a patriot is. _Coun._ Ay!--and pray, brother, what sort of an animal is he? _O’Dogh._ Why he is a sort of a political weathercock, that is blown about by every wind of society, which the foolish people are always looking up at, and staring, and distracting themselves with the integrity of its vicissitudes--to-day it is blown by the rough, rattling, tempest of party; next day by the trade-wind of sly, subtle, veering faction; then by the headlong hurricane of the people’s hot foggy breath; huzza boys, down with the courtier, up with the patriot, ’till at last the smooth, soft, gentle warm breeze of interest blows upon it, and from that moment it rusts to a point, and never stirs after--so there is your puff patriot for you--ogh, to the devil I pitch them all. _Coun._ Ha, ha, ha! I am glad to find, brother, that you are come to that way of thinking at last, and I wish you had had the same notions years ago, it would have saved you many thousands. _O’Dogh._ Indeed, and that it would--however experience is an excellent tutor, and as you are a young man, and just coming into the world, mine may be of some service to you; take this judgment from me then, and remember that an honest quiet country gentleman who out of policy and humanity establishes manufactories, or that contrives employment for the idle and the industrious, or that makes but a blade of corn grow where there was none before, is of more use to this poor country than all the courtiers, and patriots, and politicians, and prodigals that are unhanged;--so there let us leave them and return to my wife’s business. _Coun._ With all my heart, I long to have a particular account of her conduct.