How easy it is for
one benevolent being to diffuse pleasure around him! and how
truly is a kind heart a fountain of gladness, making everything
in its vicinity to freshen into smiles! The joyous disposition of
the worthy squire was perfectly contagious; he was happy himself,
and disposed to make all the world happy, and the little
eccentricities of his humor did but season, in a manner, the
sweetness of his philanthropy.
When the ladies had retired, the conversation, as usual, became
still more animated; many good things were broached which had
been thought of during dinner, but which would not exactly do for
a lady's ear; and, though I cannot positively affirm that there
was much wit uttered, yet I have certainly heard many contests of
rare wit produce much less laughter. Wit, after all, is a mighty
tart, pungent ingredient, and much too acid for some stomachs;
but honest good-humor is the oil and wine of a merry meeting, and
there is no jovial companionship equal to that where the jokes
are rather small and the laughter abundant.
The squire told several long stories of early college pranks and
adventures, in some of which the parson had been a sharer, though
in looking at the latter it required some effort of imagination
to figure such a little dark anatomy of a man into the
perpetrator of a madcap gambol.
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