The same lady once consulted the Doctor on the degree of turpitude to be attached to her son’s robbing an orchard. “Madam,” said Johnson, “it all depends upon the weight of the boy. I remember my schoolfellow Davy Garrick, who was always a little fellow, robbing a dozen of orchards with impunity, but the very first time I climbed up an apple tree, for I was always a heavy boy, the bough broke with me, and it was called a judgment. I suppose that’s why Justice is represented with a pair of scales.” Caleb Whitefoord, the famous punster, once inquired seriously of Dr. Johnson whether he really considered that a man ought to be transported, like Barrington, the pickpocket, for being guilty of a double meaning. “Sir,” said Johnson, “if a man means well, the more he means the better.” THE GREAT EARTHQUAKE AT MARY-LE-BONE. “Do you never deviate?”--JOHN BULL. IT was on the evening of the 7th of November, 18--, that I went by invitation to sup with my friend P., at his house in Highstreet, Mary-le-bone. The only other person present was a Portuguese, by name Senor Mendez, P.’s mercantile agent at Lisbon, a person of remarkably retentive memory, and most wonderful power of description. The conversation somehow turned upon the memorable great earthquake at Lisbon, in the year of our Lord----, and Senor Mendez, who was residing at that time in the Portuguese capital, gave us a very lively picture--if lively it may be called--of the horrors of that awful convulsion of nature. The picture was dreadful; the Senor’s own house, a substantial stone mansion, was rent from attic to cellar: and the steeple of his parish church left impending over it at an angle surpassing that of the famous Leaning Tower of Bologna! The Portuguese had a wonderfully expressive countenance, with a style of narration indescribably vivid; and as I listened with the most intense interest, every dismal circumstance of the calamity became awfully distinct to my apprehension. I could hear the dreary ringing of the bells, self-tolled from the rocking of the churches; the swaying to and fro of the steeples themselves, and the unnatural heavings and swellings of the Tagus, were vividly before me. As the agitations increased, the voice of the Senor became awfully tremulous, and his seat seemed literally to rock under him. I seemed palsied, and could see from P.’s looks that he was similarly affected. To conceal his disorder, he kept swallowing large gulps from his rummer, and I followed his example. [Illustration: “DO THY SPIRITING GENTLY.”]