"My conceit of his person,"--it is Ben Jonson speaking of Lord Bacon,--"was never increased towards him by his _place_ or _honours_. But I have, and do reverence him for the _greatness_, that was only proper to himself; in that he seemed to me ever one of the _greatest_ men, that had been in many ages. In his adversity I ever prayed that heaven would give him strength; for _greatness_ he could not want." The quality here commended was scarcely less conspicuous in the subject of these idle reminiscences, than in my Lord Verulam. Those who have imagined that an unexpected elevation to the direction of a great London Theatre, affected the consequence of Elliston, or at all changed his nature, knew not the essential _greatness_ of the man whom they disparage. It was my fortune to encounter him near St. Dunstan's Church (which, with its punctual giants, is now no more than dust and a shadow), on the morning of his election to that high office. Grasping my hand with a look of significance, he only uttered,--"Have you heard the news?"--then with another look following up the blow, he subjoined, "I am the future Manager of Drury Lane Theatre."--Breathless as he saw me, he stayed not for congratulation or reply, but mutely stalked away, leaving me to chew upon his new-blown dignities at leisure. In fact, nothing could be said to it. Expressive silence alone could muse his praise. This was in his _great_ style. But was he less _great_, (be witness, O ye Powers of Equanimity, that supported in the ruins of Carthage the consular exile, and more recently transmuted for a more illustrious exile the barren constableship of Elba into an image of Imperial France), when, in melancholy after-years, again, much near the same spot, I met him, when that sceptre had been wrested from his hand, and his dominion was curtailed to the petty managership, and part proprietorship, of the small Olympic, _his Elba?_ He still played nightly upon the boards of Drury, but in parts alas! allotted to him, not magnificently distributed by him. Waiving his great loss as nothing, and magnificently sinking the sense of fallen _material_ grandeur in the more liberal resentment of depreciations done to his more lofty _intellectual_ pretensions, "Have you heard" (his customary exordium)--"have you heard," said he, "how they treat me? they put me in _comedy_." Thought I--but his finger on his lips forbade any verbal interruption--"where could they have put you better?" Then, after a pause--"Where I formerly played Romeo, I now play Mercutio,"--and so again he stalked away, neither staying, nor caring for, responses.