Note 8 — XVII.

I know a clergyman who has just been obliged to give up an excellent living, for having refused to comply with the request of the squire of the neighbourhood, that he should adorn himself with that certificate of stupidity, that decoration of reformed drunkards, the Blue Ribbon.

The clergyman is a simpleton. To get or keep a good living, I would not hesitate to put a piece of blue ribbon in my buttonhole: it is so easy to put it in one’s pocket, while one takes a glass of grog or generous Bordeaux.