some imp of the weather has got inside it, and he shoots out the corkscrew in the man's face, hitting him severely on the nose, and deluging him in frothing, foamy liquid. To his credit be it spoken, however, there is not the ghost of a smile upon his face, only ale, as he takes a cloth and wipes himself. Mr. Vasher catches my eye and laughs. I am glad he has some sense of the ridiculous; people are so difficult to get on with who have none. I wish he was on my side of the table, and not all that way off. Mrs. Lister is opposite me, and I make a discovery concerning her; she wears false teeth and they do not fit her. She will choke herself some day. Perhaps if she were to return them to the dentist and say—
What is their use, sir, to me?"
he would give her a set that might fit her better.
"There's my precious," exclaims Alice, lifting her head and listening; and sure enough certain clucks and coos and chokes in the distance announce the advent of the olive branches.
The door opens and enter two nurses bearing aloft a small Lovelace and a smaller Luttrell, who are deposited by the same on their mothers' laps. Milly's baby is very young yet, and has that peculiarly decrepid look that extreme youth and age seem to share equally. His wonderful little hands are as shrivelled and wrinkled as though he had taken in washing for a hundred years. He is too small to be troublesome, and lies flat on his back, staring about him and taking a meal off his fists. Alice's son is a different matter. He is eighteen months old, and of an inquiring, avaricious turn of mind. He drinks wine out of his mother's glass without winking; he smashes a plate or two, and nearly puts out his eyes with a fork. He takes a fancy to some bright, golden coloured jelly before him, but when he has some on a plate
