_For the Table Book._
A cobbler, who lived on indifferent terms with his wife in
Kingsmead-street, Bath, somewhat like Nell and Jobson, kept a magpie,
that learned his favourite ejaculatory exclamation--“What the plague art
_(h)at_?” Whoever came to his shop, where the bulk of his business was
carried on, the magpie was sure to use this exclamation; but the bird
was matched by the ghostly, bodily, and tall person of “Hats to dress!”
a well-known street perambulator and hat improver, who, with that cry,
daily passed the temple of Crispin. The magpie aspirating _at_ with _h_,
the crier of “Hats to dress!” considered it a personal insult, and after
long endurance, one morning put the bird into his bag, and walked away
with his living plague. When he reached home, “poor mag!” was daintily
fed, and became a favourite with the dresser’s wife. It chanced,
however, that the cobbler, who supplied the _sole_ understanding of
“Hats to dress!” waited on him to be rebeavered for his own
understanding. The magpie, hearing his old master’s voice, cried out,
“What the plague art _(h)at_?” “Ha, ha, ha,” said the astonished and
delighted cobbler, “come to fetch thee home, thou ’scapegrace.” The
hatter and the cobbler drank their explanation over a quart of ale; and
with a new, old, hat on his head, the latter trudged through
Stall-street, with his magpie in his apron, crying, “_What the plague
art (h)at?_”
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