Pun-making was a fashion among the conversationists of that day, and took the place of better wit.

Nobody ever left me so much as a fi-pun note.

Old Mr. Sheridan observed, upon my mentioning it to him, 'He liked your compliment so well, he was willing to take it with pun sauce.'

Generally there is a subtile coincidence between his meaning and what the sound of the pun signifies, and thus the pun becomes an amusing or illustrative image, or a most emphatic and striking condensation of his thought.

The well-known punning exclamation of Pope Gregory, on observing the fairness and beauty of some English children,"Non Angli, sed Angeli forent, si essent Christiani,"may have set the fervid brain of Spenser on fire, and suggested the divine origin of her he loved.