But what signifies my repugnance?
my father drags me up to his counsel learned in the law,--'Are you quite ready to come on to-day, Mr.Crossbite ?--This is my son, designed for the bar--I take the liberty to bring him with me to-day to the consultation, merely that he may see how these things are managed.' Mr.Crossbite smiles and bows; as a lawyer smiles on the solicitor who employs him, and I dare say, thrusts his tongue into his cheek, and whispers into the first great wig that passes him, 'What the d--l does old Fairford mean by letting loose his whelp on me ?' As I stood beside them, too much vexed at the childish part I was made to play to derive much information from the valuable arguments of Mr.
Crossbite, I observed a rather elderly man, who stood with his eyes firmly bent on my father, as if he only waited an end of the business in which he was engaged, to address him.

There was something, I thought, in the gentleman's appearance which commanded attention.

Yet his dress was not in the present taste, and though it had once been magnificent, was now antiquated and unfashionable.

His coat was of branched velvet, with a satin lining, a waistcoat of violet-coloured silk, much embroidered; his breeches the same stuff as the coat.

He wore square-toed shoes, with foretops, as they are called; and his silk stockings were rolled up over his knee, as you may have seen in pictures, and here and there on some of those originals who seem to pique themselves on dressing after the mode of Methuselah.