Note 51 — SIR WILLIAM WELLER PEPYS.

The means for charitable contributions upon so liberal a scale as those of Sir W. W. Pepys, may, perhaps, be deduced, by analogy, from his wise and rare spirit of calculation: how to live with the Greater and the Richer, and yet escape either the risk of ruin, or the charge of meanness. “When I think it right,” said he, in a visit which he made to this Memorialist, after walking, and alone, at eighty-five, from Gloucester-place to Bolton-street, about three weeks before his death, “When I think it right, whether for the good of my excellent children, or for my own pleasure,—or for my little personal dignity, to invite some wealthy Noble to dine with me, I make it a point not to starve my family, or my poor pensioners, for a year afterwards, by emulating his lordship’s, or his grace’s, table-fare. I give, therefore, but a few dishes, and two small courses; all my care is, that every thing shall be well served, and the best of its kind. And when we sit down, I frankly tell them my plan; upon which my guests, more flattered by that implied acknowledgment of their superior rank and rent-roll, than they could possibly be by any attempt at emulation; and happy to find that they shall make no breach in my domestic economy and comfort, immediately fall to, with an appetite that would surprise you! and that gives me the greatest gratification. I do not suppose that they anywhere make a more hearty meal.”