"Where will you live?" "In the black-hole of Calcutta." "How many servants will you keep?" "Two millions, five hundred thousand." "I must say, you are moderate, considering the lady's fortune. In asking the girls, I merely reverse the questions: 'From whom did you receive your first offer?' etc. As the game wants a name, I think it should be called 'Confidante:' the reader not only has a confidante in the play, but is called upon to intrust his secrets to the whole assembled company." "But isn't this rather silly--all this about love and marriage?" asked Mr. Wyndham, with the hesitating manner of one who knows that he shall instantly be put down. "Certainly it is, my dear uncle," answered Cornelia. "If it were not, we should not like it half so well, I can tell you. You know we must be foolish some time in our life--so, for my share, I'm taking it out now." "Well, well--there's no harm in it, any how. Though you wouldn't believe it, I was young once myself, and don't like to be too hard upon the rising generation. There's a game I remember playing when I was a youngster, that is not too wise for you, but ought to have more solidity in it than the last, as it is all about lead. It is called the 'Lead-Merchant.' One tries in every mode to dispose of his lead to the company, asking question after question, to which you must answer without introducing the words _lead_, _I_, _yes_, or _no_. He tries to trip you in every way, and as soon as you say one of the forbidden words, you are out of the game. Would you like to try it?" "Very much, uncle. Will you be the lead-merchant?" "If you wish it. Amy, will you buy any lead?" "Not any at present." "But pray, why not?" "Because none is desired at my house." "Shall I call next week?" "It is scarcely worth while: we do not wish any." "I will stop to-morrow: your little boys want lead to make some bullets." "They would only burn their sweet little fingers in melting it: they must not have any." "Then you will not buy my lead?" "Positively not." "I noticed that the lead upon your roof wanted repairing: the rain will beat in, and you'll all be taken ill, unless you buy my lead. 'Tis only one cent a pound." "If you gave it to me as a present, I wouldn't take your lead." "Amy, you're caught! You said both _I_ and _lead_." Notwithstanding all their care, the persevering lead-merchant entrapped every one in some moment of weakness; and the company agreed that he would make his fortune as a Yankee pedlar, or as an agent for some book that nobody wanted,--many would buy to get rid of him, on the same principle that the lady married her tiresome lover. "And now," said Charlie, "let us play 'Trades.' We apprentice our son or daughter to some business, and mention that the first thing sold begins with a specified letter: but we must never repeat an article. The person who guesses, apprentices his son the next. I apprenticed my son to a carpenter, and the first thing he sold was a T."