six in the morning
This distinction I have never met with any one able to account for : it is sufficient that , so far from looking on each other as brethren in the Christian language , they seem scarce to regard each other as of the same species . This , the terms `` strange persons , people one does not know , the creature , wretches , beasts , brutes , '' and many other appellations evidently demonstrate ; which Mrs Slipslop , having often heard her mistress use , thought she had also a right to use in her turn ; and perhaps she was not mistaken ; for these two parties , especially those bordering nearly on each other , to wit , the lowest of the high , and the highest of the low , often change their parties according to place and time ; for those who are people of fashion in one place are often people of no fashion in another . And with regard to time , it may not be unpleasant to survey the picture of dependance like a kind of ladder ; as , for instance ; early in the morning arises the postillion , or some other boy , which great families , no more than great ships , are without , and falls to brushing the clothes and cleaning the shoes of John the footman ; who , being drest himself , applies his hands to the same labours for Mr Second-hand , the squire 's gentleman ; the gentleman in the like manner , a little later in the day , attends the squire ; the squire is no sooner equipped than he attends the levee of my lord ; which is no sooner over than my lord himself is seen at the levee of the favourite , who , after the hour of homage is at an end , appears himself to pay homage to the levee of his sovereign . Nor is there , perhaps , in this whole ladder of dependance , any one step at a greater distance from the other than the first from the second ; so that to a philosopher the question might only seem , whether you would chuse to be a great man at six in the morning , or at two in the afternoon . And yet there are scarce two of these who do not think the least familiarity with the persons below them a condescension , and , if they were to go one step farther , a degradation . And now , reader , I hope thou wilt pardon this long digression , which seemed to me necessary to vindicate the great character of Mrs Slipslop from what low people , who have never seen high people , might think an absurdity ; but we who know them must have daily found very high persons know us in one place and not in another , to-day and not to-morrow ; all which it is difficult to account for otherwise than I have here endeavoured ; and perhaps , if the gods , according to the opinion of some , made men only to laugh at them , there is no part of our behaviour which answers the end of our creation better than this . But to return to our history : Adams , who knew no more of this than the cat which sat on the table , imagining Mrs Slipslop 's memory had been much worse than it really was , followed her into the next room , crying out , `` Madam Slipslop , here is one of your old acquaintance ; do but see what a fine woman she is grown since she left Lady Booby 's service . ''