The things we do!

Johnson and Colonel Newcome, most of us have a
sneaking regard for honest Tom, and hope Sophia will be happy, and Tom
will end well at last.
Five-and-twenty years ago the young Earl of Kew came upon the town, which
speedily rang with the feats of his lordship. He began life time enough
to enjoy certain pleasures from which our young aristocracy of the
present day seem, alas! to be cut off. So much more peaceable and
polished do we grow, so much does the spirit of the age appear to
equalise all ranks; so strongly has the good sense of society, to which
in the end gentlemen of the very highest fashion must bow, put its veto
upon practices and amusements with which our fathers were familiar. At
that time the Sunday newspapers contained many and many exciting reports
of boxing-matches. Bruising was considered a fine manly old English
custom. Boys at public schools fondly perused histories of the noble
science, from the redoubtable days of Broughton and Slack, to the heroic
times of Dutch Sam and the Game Chicken.


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