BOB THE MISER'S DOG.

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This extreme love of money overcame every other consideration; and to his attachment to gain may be accounted his strange behaviour as before related, to his sister at her latter end. But in one singular instance he seemed in some measure to forego his favourite idea of saving. He had a dog, of which he was extremely fond, and which he called by the familiar appellation of "Bob." His treatment of this animal offers an instance of that inconsistency in human actions, which philosophy seeks in vain to account for. "While his parsimony was so severe, that he denied himself a penny loaf a day, and existed entirely upon Lady Tempest's pot liquor, and the scraps from her kitchen; he allowed his dog a pint of milk daily, with other dainties, which he would have thought a sinful waste to have procured for himself. Upon a complaint being made to him that his favourite Bob had worried some of his neighbour's sheep, he took the dog to a farrier's shop, and had all his teeth filed down. For this barbarous action he never assigned any reason; possibly it might be to prevent the like again, as he might shrewdly guess that any further damage from his dog's mischievous manner, might bring expenses upon him. His sister being dead and finding himself lonesome, he hired a man for his companion, and in his choice he showed much discernment; for his man Griffiths was a proper counterpart of himself. When they went out,

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DANIEL DANCER AND HIS MAN GRIFFITHS.

they took different roads, though both followed the same occupation; only that the servant indulged more taste for strong beer; a liquor which Mr. Dancer carefully avoided, as costing money; but Griffiths would tipple a little, which was the cause of much altercation, when these saving souls met, after their day's labour. However, Griffiths generally came loaded with bones, some of which having upon them still some fragments of flesh, served to heighten their repast, and to quiet his master's anger. This fellow had, by as severe a parsimony as that exercised by Mr. Dancer, contrived to accumulate five hundred pounds out of wages, which had never exceeded ten pounds per annum. At the time he lived with Mr. Dancer, he was upwards of sixty, and hired himself to him for eighteen pence a week."

Lady Tempest was the only person who had any influence on this unfortunate miser. She employed every contrivance to make him partake of those conveniences and indulgences, which his fortune could supply, and his advanced years required; but all her entreaties were without effect, and were only answered with such interrogatories as, "Where was he to get the money?"-"How could he afford it? If it was not for some charitable assistance, how could he live ?" One day however, this lady, after a great deal of persuasion, prevailed upon Dancer to purchase a hat, which he did of a Jew, for a shilling, having worn the one he then

DANCER'S LAST ILLNESS.

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possessed upwards of fourteen years, but he still considered it too good to throw away. When Lady Tempest visited him the next time, she, to her great astonishment, perceived him still with his old hat on. On importuning him for the reason, he at last told her, that after much solicitation, he had prevailed on his old man Griffiths, to give him sixpence profit upon the hat he had purchased by her desire a few days before.

Mr. Dancer had arrived at his seventy-eighth year, before he felt any serious cause of complaint, to call in a doctor; his antipathy to the medical tribe has been already mentioned; therefore it was in vain to advise him to take any medicine, even when there was a necessity for it.

In 1794, during the illness which terminated the life of this miserable object of avarice, Lady Tempest accidentally called upon him, and found him lying in an old sack, which came up to his chin, and his head wrapped up in pieces of the same materials, as big as a bee hive. On her remonstrating against the impropriety of such a situation, he observed, that being a very poor man he could not afford better; and, having come into the world without a shirt, he was determined to go out in the same manner. As he brought nothing with him, he did not think he had any right to carry anything away; and the less he made use of he thought was the more acceptable to God; so that, in his last moments, he

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A HINT TO SNUFFTAKERS.

made his saving notions square with his most serious thoughts. Lady Tempest then requested him to have a pillow to raise his head, which he refused, but ordered his old servant Griffiths to bring him some litter out of the stable to raise his head, as the lady thought he would lie easier.

Though Mr. Dancer never indulged himself in the extravagant luxury of snuff-taking, yet he was careful always to solicit a pinch or two from those who did; but it was not to gratify his own nose, but rather to gratify, in a minor point of view, his love of hoarding; all that he collected by these friendly offerings, he carefully saved up and put into. a box, which he carried about him for that purpose; and when full he would barter its contents at a neighbouring chandler's shop for a farthing candle, which he made last until he had replenished his box again.

His opinion of professors of physic was rather singular, and seemed to border upon predestination. To use his own language, the medical tinkers were all a set of rogues; that while they patched up one hole, always contrived to make two, for a better job; but he allowed that there was some utility in the art of surgery, in repairing accidental fractures; but he always qualified the admission with the reflection that its practitioners were a set of extortioners.

His prejudice against the whole tribe of lawyers was

THE MISER'S DISTASTE FOR LAW.

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determined in the extreme, and his aversion to this class of men was so great, that he would even forego his own interest, to gratify his resentment; as the following anecdote will prove.

"Having, as was usually his half yearly custom, agreed with an old clothes woman for a shirt for half a crown, as he thought, the dealer called at his house, and left him one worth three shillings; but for which he refused to pay any more than his original agreement of two shillings and sixpence. Notwithstanding the party urged the goodness and the fineness of the article Mr. Dancer was impenetrable, and no more than the half crown would he pay; which the woman as peremptorily refusing, at last applied to the Court of Requests of the district, to which he was obliged to repair, although it cost him fivepence on the journey for bread and cheese, and the cost of hearing, &c.; in all upwards of four and sixpence." This had such an effect on Mr. Dancer's mind, that he ever afterwards held the lawyers in abhorrence; for to give or to pay, were not to be found in his vocabulary. Addition and multiplication were his favourite rules, and usury was the foundation of his good deeds.

"The most delightful task of Mr. Dancer's life was to count his gold, and to visit the holes where it lay deposited, and to see that all was safe. Upon one of these nocturnal visits he was not a little frightened: while count