JOHN LEECH

AND OTHER PAPERS

BY JOHN BROWN, M.D.

LL.D., ETC.

FOURTH EDITION

EDINBURGH

DAVID DOUGLAS

MDCCCLXXXII.

PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION.

VERY man is two men at the least.

EVE

Sydney Smith says St. Paul was a thousand men. But every man is good and bad, wise and foolish, conceited and not. It is the preponderance that makes the difference and the outward man. As one of the bravest men in the British army once said to me, 'When we go into battle we are all afraid, but we don't all show it.'

Well, when my friend and publisher spoke to me of putting these odds and ends into a volume, I said at first 'No;' now I am saying 'Yes,' though I still feel both. No one can so well know of how little worth much of these occasional papers-what old Creech would have called Fugitive Pieces-are, how much better

they might and ought to have been-as their author: this was the No-the Yes was a sneaking hope that others might not altogether agree with me. This was the conceit and vanity bit having its say. The struggle, somewhat protracted, as to which would prevail, is now over. The 'bit' and David Douglas have prevailed, and I must content myself, after the manner of the deliverance of Socrates and Voltaire on a more important matter, with the reflection that whether I said yes or no I would regret it.

With regard to the paper which gives its name to this volume, I hardly know how to excuse myself, it is so unworthy of its delightful subject, so much more so now than when it appeared in the North British Review, by reason of its not having the woodcuts. It may truly be said that it is dished for want of the plates-to give a twist to Rogers's wellknown joke. My only hope is that the reader, in his anger at being asked to look at what he