; or
Italian, "Chi lo sa?" "Pazienza!" "Ahime!" or even Latin, "Eheu
fugaces," and "Vidi tantum!" for he had been an Eton boy. It must have
been very cheap Latin, for I could always understand it myself! He drew
the line at German and Greek; fortunately, for so do I. He was a
bachelor, and his domestic arrangements had been irregular, and I will
not dwell upon them; but his house, as far as it went, seemed to promise
better things.
His architect, Mr. Lintot, an extraordinary little man, full of genius
and quite self-made, became my friend and taught me to smoke, and drink
gin and water.
He did his work well; but of an evening he used to drink more than was
good for him, and rave about Shelley, his only poet. He would recite
"The Skylark" (his only poem) with uncertain _h_'s, and a rather
cockney accent--
"'_Ail to thee blythe sperrit!
Bird thou never wert,
That from 'eaven, or near it
Po'rest thy full 'eart
In profuse strains of hunpremeditated hart_."
As the evening wore on his recitations became "low comic," and quite
admirable for accent and humour. He could imitate all the actors in
London (none of which I had seen) so well as to transport me with
delight and wonder; and all this with nobody but me for an audience, as
we sat smoking and drinking together in his room at the "Ibbetson Arms.
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