The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-04-19 00:00:00

CLUB LAW,

No man, we presume, who has a house of his own and a
tolerably large circle of acquaintance, dines at a club, except
as a matter of convenience—always excepting house dinners
and trials of skill in gastromimy. It should, therefore, be
held, if he sit down to dine alone, that his object is to BE
alone—to dine, and to go wherever his business or pleasure
calls him ; and no man should take the deciding step of in-
viting himself to dine with him, unasked, any more than he
would in his own house. If the originally planted dinner be-
gins the colloquy by an invitation to the next arrival, what
can be better or more agreeable ? but, as it appeared to Jack,
the most active self-bidders—the chair-placing offenders of
themselves to the unhappy solitaire who desired of all things
to dine alone—were uniformly the greatest bores of the whole
community._ _ _

" If," said Jack to himself upon the occasion to which we
now refer, " the rule in clubs were that men should hold the
little table at which one dines sacred, and that, until they
were asked, they would not make one' at it, all would be
well: in all other respects this club house is my house in
common with others ; but my little table is as much mine,
individually and exclusively, as my larger table in Gro-svenor-
street. To-day I like to dine ; lam not in the humour to
talk, or laugh, or drink, or eat—and here I am by myself.
If I want a companicn, there are plenty to join me; but still
I say, Won't you sit down?'—' Won't you come and dine
here?' or some such provocative, I do expect to find myself
as much alone as if I were in my own dinner parlour with the
house door intervening between me and the street."
" How do you do, Mr. Batley ?" said a most respectable
fellow of Ma'dalene, drawing his chair to the table where the
repulsed Lothario was sitting.
How do you do, doctor ?" said Batley.
" Pray," said the doctor, " have you, heafdanythinglately
of poor Dick Dowbiggen?"—and then turning away without
waiting for an answer, added, " Waiter, bring my glass of
negus here."
Batley wished him in—his college, at least.
No," said Jack,' I haven't heard of him for some times'
" He's going"' said the doctor, " very fast ; gout, asthma,
and a touch of erysipelas ?—why, you know, Batley, we can't
last for ever. He must be about your standing, I think."
" My standing I" said Batley, and all his, hopes of • inatri--
moray rushed Into his mind ;•' is may senior by twenty
years, doctor." = _ _
. .

" Oh ! perhaps so," said Dr. Bottomly;••" I may mistake;
—but.you were both at.Ma'dalene together."
",..A.h!" said Batley, " but he was at least old enough to he
my father. - Why, he was a fellow when I was an under-
graduate."
" Probably," said Dr. Bottomly ; " but you were always
Old-looking of your
To Batley, with the curly wig, the uncommon stock, the
extraordinary waistcoat, and the sort of coat he wore, this
was a hateful observation.

" Waiter," said Jack, " my bill 1"
" Are you going ?" said the doctor.
" Yes," said Jack ; " I have an engagement at ten, and it
wants only a quarter. I thought you were going yourself."
No," said the doctor ; " no ; I purposed having half an
hour's chat with you about old times, over my nevus."
" I don't care much about old times," said Batley ; " I
always keep looking forward, doctor."
And then Batley went off in a strain which quite astonished
the venerable fellow, and led him to suspect that his compa-
nion was not altogether in the possession of his right senses ;
after which exhibition of principles and opinions, he disbursed
his four shillin&s and sixpence for his cutlet and pint of sher-
ry, and took leave of .the snug corner in which he bad en-
sconced himself to be quiet, but out of which he had been
driven by the extraordinary good nature and attention of his
reverend and venerated friend.