Now as it is the undeniable fact that I was wedded when a mere juvenile, I shall save my brush from this near shave--provided that Mr CHUCKERBUTTY RAM has received my tip in time and does not, like Hon'ble CUMMERBUND, go beyond his instructions. But this is not reasonably probable, Baboo CHUCKERBUTTY RAM being a tolerably discreet, subtle chap. XXI _Mr Jabberjee halloos before he is quite out of the Wood._ Being (to my best of belief) satisfactorily off with the old love, I naturally became as playful as a kitten or gay as a grig. For the most superficial observer, and with the half of a naked optic, could easily discern the immeasurable superiority of Miss WEE-WEE to JESSIMINA in all the refinements and delicacies of a real English lady, and although, up to present date, the timidity of girlishness has restrained Miss ALLBUTT-INNETT from reciprocating my increasing spooniness, her parents and brother are of an overwhelming cordiality, and repeatedly mention their ardent hope that I may become their guest up in the hills some time this autumn. So that Hope is already recommencing to hop jauntily about the secret chamber of my heart. For, seeing the magnanimous contempt for the snobbishness of chasing a tuft that actuates their bosoms, I am no longer apprehensive that their affection for this present writer will be at all impaired by the revelation that he is merely a member of nature's nobility. Rather the contrary. As Poet BURNS remarks with great truthfulness, "_Rank is but a penny stamp and a Man is a Man and all that._" Nevertheless, for the present, I am resolved to remain mum as a mouse. Since I am now in their pockets for a perpetuity, I was privileged on a recent evening to escort the ALLBUTT-INNETT ladies to the Empire of India Exhibition, upon which I shall now pronounce the opinion of an expert, though space forbids me to describe its multitudinous marvels, save with the brevity of a soul of wit. In the Cinghalese Palace we beheld a highly pious _Yogi_ from Ceylon, who had trained himself to perform his devotions with one of his legs embracing his neck, or walking upon the caps of his knees with his toes inserted into his waistband. But I am not convinced that such a style of prayer-making is at all superior in reverence to more ordinary attitudes, especially when exhibited publicly for an _honorarium_. I feel proud to narrate that, at Miss WEE-WEE'S urgent entreaties, I subdued my native funkiness so far as to make the revolution of the Gigantic Wheel, in spite of grave apprehensions that it would prove but a house of cards, or suddenly become totally immobile--though to pass interminable hours at a lofty attitude with such a lively companion might, on secondary thoughts, have possessed pleasing saccharine compensations. Nevertheless, I was relieved when we descended without having hitched anywhere, and I did most firmly decline to fly in the face of Providence for five shillings in the basket of a captive balloon.