several times with a paper-folder, which he caught up for the purpose.  After disposing of his victim in this way, he was not satisfied, for the dull lecture still went on in the other room, and he fired an imaginary revolver several times at an imaginary head.  Still, the droning speaker proceeded with his frozen subject (it was something about the Arctic regions, if I remember rightly), and now began the greatest pantomimic scene of all, namely, murder by poison, after the manner in which the player king is disposed of in Hamlet.  Thackeray had found a small vial on the mantel-shelf, and out of that he proceeded to pour the imaginary “juice of cursed hebenon” into the imaginary porches of somebody’s ears.  The whole thing was inimitably done, and I hoped nobody saw it but myself; but years afterwards, a ponderous, fat-witted young man put the question squarely to me:  “What was the matter with Mr. Thackeray, that night the club met at Mr ——­’s house?”

Overhearing me say one morning something about the vast attractions of London to a greenhorn like myself, he broke in with, “Yes, but you have not seen the grandest one yet!  Go with me to-day to St. Paul’s and hear the charity children sing.”  So we went, and I saw the “head cynic of literature,” the “hater of humanity,” as a critical dunce in the Times once called him, hiding his bowed face, wet with tears, while his whole frame shook with emotion, as the children of poverty rose to pour out their anthems of praise.  Afterwards he wrote in one of his books this passage, which seems to me perfect in its feeling and tone:—­

“And yet there is one day in the year when I think St. Paul’s presents the noblest sight in the whole world; when five thousand charity children, with cheeks like nosegays, and sweet, fresh voices, sing the hymn which makes every heart thrill with praise and happiness.  I have seen a hundred grand sights in the world,—­coronations, Parisian splendors, Crystal Palace openings, Pope’s chapels with their processions of long-tailed cardinals and quavering choirs of fat soprani,—­but think in all Christendom there is no such sight as Charity Children’s day. Non Anglei, sed angeli.  As one looks at that beautiful multitude of innocents; as the first note strikes; indeed one may almost fancy that cherubs are singing.”

I parted with Thackeray for the last time in the street, at midnight, in London, a few months before his death.  The Cornhill Magazine, under his editorship, having proved a very great success, grand dinners were given every month in honor of the new venture.  We had been sitting late at one of these festivals, and, as it was getting toward morning, I thought it wise, as far as I was concerned, to be moving homeward before the sun rose.  Seeing my intention to withdraw, he insisted on driving me in his brougham to my lodgings.  When we reached the outside door of our host, Thackeray’s servant, seeing a stranger with his master, touched