THE chief defect in the society of this place is, specifically, pretty much the same as in every provincial town I have ever visited; but I think it seems to be carried to a greater length here than any where else. This defect consists in nothing more than an extreme fondness for small jokes and nicknames—the wit of the place being almost entirely expended in these ingenious kinds of paltrinesses;—its object being, as it would appear, never to give pleasure to the present, otherwise than by throwing impertinent stigmas on the absent. Almost every person of the least importance is talked of, in familiar conversation, not by his proper name, but by some absurd designation, borrowed from some fantastical view of his real or imaginary peculiarities. It is really distressing to see how much countenance this vulgar kind of practice receives, even from the best of those one meets with here. But the most amusing part of the thing is, that each is aware of the existence of every nickname but his own, and rejoices in making use of it, little thinking that the moment his back is turned, he is himself subjected to the very same kind of treatment from those who have been joining in his laugh.

Another favourite species of Glasgow wit, however, is exercised in the presence of the individuals against whom it is levelled; and it is not to be denied, that there is much more both of ingenuity and of honesty in this species. I believe I should rather say there are two such kinds of wit—at least I have heard familiar use of two separate designations for their quizzing. I do not pretend to have analyzed the matter very closely; but, so far as I have been able to comprehend it, the case stands thus:—

In every party at Glasgow, as soon as the punch has levelled the slight barriers of civil ceremony which operate while the cloth remains on the table, the principal amusement of the company consists in the wit of some practised punster, who has been invited chiefly with an eye to this sort of exhibition, (from which circumstance he derives his own nick-name of a side-dish,) and who (as a fiddler begins to scrape his strings at the nod of his employer,) opens his battery against some inoffensive butt on the opposite side of the table, on a signal, express or implied, from the master of the feast.