Decline and Fall

I think Gibbon would have approved, although he could be a bit prickly.  I rather wish I could have been a fly on the wall when this occurred:

“The Duke of Gloucester, brother of King George III, permitted Mr. Gibbon to present him with the first volume of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. When the second volume of that work appeared, it was quite in order that it should be presented to His Royal Highness in like manner. The prince received the author with much good nature and affability, saying to him, as he laid the quarto on the table, ‘Another d-mn’d thick, square book! Always, scribble, scribble, scribble! Eh! Mr. Gibbon?’”