"I agree with you; I must try and get Lovett to discard his singular protégé, as the French say."
"'Gad, Augustus, how came you by so much learning? you know all the Poets by heart, to say nothing of Latin and French."
"Oh, hang it, I was brought up like the captain, to a literary way of life."
"That's what makes you so thick with him, I suppose. He writes (and sings too) a tolerable song, and is certainly a deuced clever fellow. What a rise in the world he has made! Do you recollect what a poor sort of way he was in when you introduced him at Gentleman George's? and now he's the Captain Crank of the gang."
"The gang! the company you mean. Gang indeed! One would think you were speaking of a knot of pickpockets. Yes, Lovett is a clever fellow; and, thanks to me, a very decent philosopher!" It is impossible to convey to our reader the grave air of importance with which Tomlinson made his concluding laudation. "Yes," said he, after a pause, "he has a bold, plain way of viewing things, and, like Voltaire, he becomes a philosopher, by being a Man of Sense! Hist!
