Whose very name conjures up the spirits of ten thousand wits, holding
both sides, over a copus of Trinity ale and a classical pun, would not
only frequently "steal a few hours from the night," but see out both
lights and liquids, and seem none the worse for the carouse. He had
one night risen for the purpose of reaching his hat from a peg to
depart, after having finished the port, sherry, gin-store, &c., when
he espied a can of _beer_, says Dyer, (surely it must have been
_audit_,) in a corner. Restoring his hat to its resting place, he
reseated himself with the following happy travestie of the old nursery
lines--
"When wine is gone, and ale is spent,
Then small beer is most excellent."
It was no uncommon thing for his _gyp_ to enter his room with
Phoebus, and find him still _en robe_, with no other companions but
a Homer, Æschylus, Plato, and a dozen or two other old Grecians
surrounding an empty bottle, or what his late Royal Highness the Duke
of York would have styled "a marine," _id est_ "a good fellow, who
had done his duty, and was ready to do it again." Upon his _gyp_ once
peeping in before day light, and finding him still up, Porson answered
his "_quod petis?_" (whether he wanted _candles_ or _liquor_,) with
[Greek: ou tode oud' allo.]
Scotticè--neither _Toddy_ nor _Tallow_.
At another time, when asked what he would drink? he
replied?--"_aliquid_" (a liquid.)