Note 25 — IRISH BEGGARS.

The deceased friend here alluded to, partook largely of the wit and intellect of a family, to whose members, male and female, it is the fashion in Ireland to apply “l’esprit de Mortimar,” as a distinction. It is saying nothing, to say of Mr. B——, that he was one of the few surviving conservators of the peculiar wit, humour, and national information which once distinguished “the order of gentlemen” in Ireland! I not only lost in him “mon meilleur causeur,” as Madame de Villette said on losing her friend Champfort, but one to whose judgment on all that was characteristically Irish, I could always refer with confidence, and by whose approbation I was always flattered and assured.