But such are the subtleties, such the quibbling reasons, with which he blinds and leads this people.

How long a course so tortuous can be pursued with safety I am incapable of guessing; not long, one would suppose; and yet this singular man has been treading the mazes for five years, and his favour at court and his popularity among the lodges still endure unbroken.
I have the privilege of slightly knowing him.

Heavily and somewhat clumsily built, of a vast, disjointed, rambling frame, he can still pull himself together, and figure, not without admiration, in the saloon or the ball-room.

His hue and temperament are plentifully bilious; he has a saturnine eye; his cheek is of a dark blue where he has been shaven.
Essentially he is to be numbered among the man-haters, a convinced contemner of his fellows.

Yet he is himself of a commonplace ambition and greedy of applause.