And the company? Indescribable! Comedians from small theatres, out of employ: pale haggard-looking boys, probably the sons of worthy traders, trying their best to break their fathers' hearts; here and there the marked features of a Jew. Now and then you might see the curious puzzled face of some greenhorn about town, or perhaps a Cantab; and men of grave age, and gray-haired, were there, and amongst them a wondrous proportion of carbuncled faces and bottle noses. And when John Burley entered there was a shout, that made William Pitt shake in his frame. Such stamping and hallooing, and such hurrahs for "Burly John." And the gentleman who had filled the great high leathern chair in his absence gave it up to John Burley; and Leonard, with his grave observant eye, and lip half sad and half scornful, placed himself by the side of his introducer. There was a nameless expectant stir through the assembly, as when some great singer advances to the lamps, and begins "_Di tanti palpiti_." Time flies. Look at the Dutch clock over the door. Half-an-hour! John Burley begins to warm. A yet quicker light begins to break from his eye; his voice has a mellow luscious roll in it.
"He will be grand to-night," whispered a thin man who looked like a tailor, seated on the other side of Leonard.
Time flies--an hour! Look again at the Dutch clock, John Burley _is_ grand, he is in his zenith, at his culminating point. What magnificent drollery!--what luxuriant humor! How the Rabelais shakes in his easy chair! Under the rush and the roar of this fun, (what word else shall describe it,) the man's intellect is as clear as a gold sand under a river. Such wit, and such truth, and, at times, such a flood of quick eloquence. All now are listeners, silent, save in applause. And Leonard listened too. Not, as he would some nights ago, in innocent unquestioning delight. No; his mind has passed through great sorrow, great passion, and it comes out unsettled, inquiring, eager, brooding over joy itself as over a problem. And the drink circulates, and faces change; and there are gabbling and babbling; and Burley's head sinks in his bosom, and he is silent. And up starts a wild, dissolute, bacchanalian glee for seven voices. And the smoke-reek grows denser and thicker, and the gas-light looks dizzy through the haze. And John Burley's eyes reel.