When Phil had “come into his own,” when he was the favourite artist on _Punch_—favourite of the public, that is to say—he continued in the Bohemian courses which he had acquired in the lean and struggling years. At one time he was ordered horse exercise; and when he got the horse, it was thought, by the authorities at home, that it would be an excellent idea for Phil if he went into Fleet Street on horseback when business took him that way. This, it was thought, would insure his safe and early return to the domestic hearth. It answered well—for a bit. But one afternoon Phil was riding home from Fleet Street to his house in Kensington, and in passing through Leicester Square, thought that he would drop in at the “Cosy Club,” a small club then recently founded. He gave his horse in charge of an urchin to hold for him. It was then four in the afternoon. At two o’clock in the morning a police constable entered the club to inquire whether one of the members had left a horse in charge of a boy outside. The secretary remembered that May was the proud possessor of a steed. But May had left the club at midnight. He had forgotten all about his horse, and had driven home in a hansom. Of the making of penny Society papers there was no end. But of those papers themselves there was generally an early end, and of these one may more conveniently treat in the chapter “De Mortuis.” CHAPTER VI A GAY SCIENCE TO anyone born with a taste for the theatre, a _flair_ for the public demand in stage entertainment, and a desire for the society of actors and actresses, the position of dramatic critic on a London newspaper should be one of the most coveted berths on the ship. The opportunity of heralding a good play or of “slating” a bad one secures a true moment of satisfaction. Moreover, the occupation, notwithstanding the late hours, hot theatres, and liability to corporal punishment, involved, is one of the most healthy undertakings in the gift of the Press. A continuous pursuit of this gay science insures longevity. The dramatic critic is the most long-lived man in the profession. Some of the dramatic critics whom I knew in the early eighties and late seventies are still “hard at it,” I am pleased to hear. I imagine that the dramatic critic never dies. Like the majority of the plays upon which he passes judgment, he is translated or adapted.