We were all thrown into a state of such intense dumbness, such complete torpor, by the profundity of these scientific researches, that everybody tacitly admitted the appropriateness of the next subject; it was a case of still-life which met our startled eye the other evening, in the form of a pair of RUM CORKS IN STOUT BOTTLES. [Illustration] On our table stood, not one, but two "black bottles," two bottles that had held "Cork stout"--two we saw without seeing double. The corks had already been drawn, but upon them were two faces distinctly visible, which we resolved to draw likewise; and as the pencil wound itself about, we seemed to hear the following dialogue, in a sort of screw-like tone:-- "Arrah, Paddy now, and where are you from?" "Sure I'm from Cork." "Cork is it? fait den it's from Cork I am meself." [Illustration] * * * * * "Not such terrifying images, sir," said a nervous visitor, who trembled like Keeley in the old drama of the _Bottle Imp_, "not such terrifying images as that family of phantoms, that assemblage of the blues, which you conjured up in your last number. You might well call them "frights." I'm sure I've felt all over like the Derbyshire turnpike-man ever since; but I'm not at all afraid of those two bottle conjurors there." The allusion to this mysterious Derbyshire pike-man produced inquiry, and we were all forthwith reminded by our agitated companion, of a midnight scene-- A HIGHWAY ADVENTURE which was lately recorded in the public papers. It appears that when Van Amburgh travels, the large elephant goes on foot in the night, attended by four East Indians, men of negro complexions, in white dresses,--three of them riding on the elephant's back, and one on his tusks. One night as they were passing over Worksop forest, the party arrived at a toll-bar that was closed. The call "Gate" was raised, and out came the toll-keeper in his nightcap. Now it is suspected that this unfortunate individual had been long anticipating the coming of a gentleman in black, whose name is never mentioned to ears polite; for observing the monstrous and unlooked-for spectacle that then presented itself to his drowsy eyes, he, instead of opening the gate, was so terrified, that he ran back into the house, exclaiming in frantic tones, "_He's come at last!_" [Illustration] "Frightened at an elephant," cried Mr. Cavil, with a profusion of pishes! "At an elephant merely! I wonder if he ever saw a young lady--young ladies such as I have seen! I was never afraid of a woman while she wore her hair turned up, powdered, pomatumed, and frizzed like my mother's and grandmother's; but only imagine the terror of a sensitive mortal on encountering a specimen of the fashions of the present day; on meeting a sample of the feminine gender, who, not satisfied with milliner's 'whiskers,' must exhibit to the affrighted gazer a face 'BEARDED LIKE THE PARD.'