Sketches Of Character.

SKETCHES OF CHARACTER .

NO . III . —POPPLEWELL . POPPLE WELL is one of those butterflies of society who are always gaudy , if agreeably evanescent . We all of us can recall a Popplewell to-day , who basked for a time in the sunshine of the social circle , in the genialities of

domestic intercourse , and who has disappeared from the " world ' s vortex " and our acquaintance , and who is somewhere , we believe or suppose , but we know not and perhaps care not . He is like a ship we meet at sea , or a traveller we confront in the desert , or a party we parley with up the Rhigi : we speak , we meet , we part with " much oblivion" on both sides . If Popplewell has not succumbed to fate ; if the cruel sisters have not snipped in two his petty and

discoloured thread of life ; if no accident has supervened to rob society and friends of so glittering and gay a companion , Popplewell is probably retired to a quiet village , or is married and has half-a-dozen children ( enough to quiet any one ) , or has to face a termagant and pay the bills of an extravagant angel , or is shrouding himself in one of Her Majesty ' s colonies , or in the United Statesor on French or German or Spanish or Italian or Swedish soilfrom

, , miseries and matrimony , from the wife of his bosom , from the friends of his heart . Popplewell , as he looms large before me to-day , with his white shirt and choker ancl general genteel waiter appearance , is not to me a prepossessing person in appearance or manners , in tone or morals . As a rule , he talks loud and thickly , bullies his wife and his servants , knows little , but " jaws " a good deal . He is neither respectable nor cheery , pleasant nor sociable , considerate

nor charitable . He delighteth in " canards " and scandal , in agreeable " tit bits" of hopeless " gobemoucherie . " Though a waiter on Providence , an habitual diner out , one who picks his friend ' s menu to pieces as well as he does his character , he is not in any sense a kind host . True it is he giveth dinners , but they are generally dreadfully trying . The wines are bad , the entrees are cold , the cooking is detestable , and the conversation is vapid . He has the audacity to offer to his friends " dinner sherry . " Everybodis ill at

y ease , and bored , and boring even my charming neighbours , Mrs . Murray and Mrs . Hale , or that portly and pleasant bon vivant , Crawleigh Watson . Thus , as you see , kind reader , intelligent patron mine , Popplewell is to my mind , as I hope he is to yours , a Drone and not a Bee in the great hive of society . He takes your money and wine , but he gives us little of his own ; and I often ask myself why were Popplewells created ? and what possible use can he be of in

. the general framework or special outcome of society ? This I think is one of those mysteries we shall never know here . If I could think that Popplewell had one kindly aspiration or one goodly aim beyond the mere indulgence of sybaritic selfishness or a deuced bad temper , I would freel y forgive his petulance and his foppery , his childish ignorance and his hopeless " niaiserie . " But alas , such is not the case , and so I can onl y add my final conviction that Popplewell is a " fraud , " and that he really neither adds to the pleasure or delectation of society , and is , on the contrary , a nuisance , a drawback , and a bore . But alas , my friends , there are many Popplewells !