No toast can better coincide
than this, with that, which is so frequently given, of our absent
friends.
It was also a Grecian practice for each of the guests to name his
particular friend, and sometimes also his particular mistress. The
moderns have also a parallel for this. Every person gives (to use the
common phrase) his gentleman, and his lady, in his turn.
It is well known to have been the usage of the ancient Greeks, at their
entertainments, either to fill or to have had their cups filled for them
to the brim. The moderns do precisely the same thing. Glasses so
filled, have the particular name of bumpers: and however vigilantly an
ancient Greek might have looked after his guests, and made them drink
their glasses filled in this manner, the presidents of modern times are
equally vigilant in enforcing adherence to the same custom.
It was an ancient practice also with the same people to drink three
glasses when the graces, and nine when the muses were named: and three
and three times three were drank on particular occasions. This barbarous
practice has fortunately not come down to the moderns to its full
extent, but they have retained the remembrance of it, and celebrated it
in part, by following up their toasts, on any extraordinary occasion,
not with three or nine glasses of wine, but with three or nine cheers.
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