Above this last-named apartment is Brown's bedchamber, where he and the Captain are spending a quiet evening, reviewing their prospects and relating their experiences:--the Captain stating his intention of living retired upon his property, for all his friend Major Cant's trying to persuade him to take an adjoining house in Belgravia. No! he was content to stay where he was--Albert was snug; but if Mr. Brown thought of removing to Mayfair or Tyburnia, why then, a house next such a capital individual might be a desideratum:--_he_ said it--an Army Captain that should not say it, but did not care,--stock-brokers and merchants were men of bottom; though probably his friend Major Cant would say _that_ bottom meant the _baser_ stuff they were composed of--the joke was better than the simile, and neither bad. After this opinion the Captain paused to think, drink, and--with a blow that made the table quiver,--demand, to know what a man without money was _worth?_--answering the question, in the same breath, with an emphatic _nothing!_--a man of wealth _was_ a man of worth! We know not if Mr. Brown thought this logic or no;--but he, Captain de Camp, knew it, and intended to let his friends know it also; for next season he would give a grand entertainment, get Spread and Co. to throw a marquee over the lawn, and see if Major Cant would come--the Captain rather thought _he_ would; or the Hon. Sam. Dummy--the coxcomb, who, when asked to dine with Alderman Fig, in Bloomsbury Square, said _his_ horses never crossed Tottenham Court Road--Stinkomalee and the Brutish Museum savouring too much of the "people" for the exquisite;--but the Captain winked, and said he knew how the Dummy would get out of the fix--he would come along the New Road, as the Captain said he once knew him do, when in search of an asthmatic poodle that had been stolen, and was at a dog-fancier's on Pentonville Hill. Then should we have the lane filled with carriages, like at a Chiswick fete; I would introduce my friend to the world, and be at rest;--for we are a couple of old boys, willing to make sacrifices for our dear children. Having delivered himself of these lofty sentiments as the bells were ringing out the old year--stopping to strike its knell;--the Captain also stopped, to seize a glass and the hand of Brown--wishing him the merriest, maniest, and happiest of New Years;--drinking eternal unity to the B.'s and De C.'s--at the same time shedding a very visible tear, that dropped into his brandy and water, like the pearl of Cleopatra, to be sacrificed to self--to a very affectionate man--so _very_ affectionate, that he loved himself, we do believe.