“Well; let us get the pound of meat for our share, if we can. I’ll bet you a wager, Hunt, I’ll get a shilling a week more out of them for this very prank of theirs.” “Done!” cried Hunt. “I bet you a penny roll they will be too sharp for you.” “A penny roll!” exclaimed Childe. “A pint of wine is the lowest bet I ever lay, man. A pint of red port to be paid to-night. Come!” “You might as well ask me to bet a diamond,” said Hunt, laughing bitterly. “How am I to get port wine?” “I’ll show you when our business here is done,” said Childe. “Your father was my friend, or I should not open my confidence so easily. But just stand a minute at that fat woman’s elbow, will you? Just to screen me a bit. There; that will do. Don’t look round till I bid you.” When Hunt had permission to look round, he scarcely knew his companion. Childe had slipped off his worsted stocking and bound it over his forehead and chin, so as to look very sickly. He sprinkled a few grains from his snuff-box into his eyes, so as to look blear-eyed, and forthwith set himself to tremble all over, except his right arm which appeared stiff. “I have had a slight stroke of palsy this week, you see,” said he. “I can just get abroad to show that I must have another shilling a week.—Hang it, Hunt, it is not worth the trouble for such a trifle, if it was not for the bet!” Hunt thought a shilling a week no trifle, and wondered how Childe came by such mighty notions. “Because I’ve an _e_ at the end of my name, man, that’s all. That little letter makes a great man of me. It is worth house and board and tobacco and clothes to me for the whole of my old age. You think I am mad, I see; but, hark’ee! did you never hear of Childe’s hospital?” “Yes; near London. Is not it?” “Yes; and I have the next turn there, and a merry life I make of it till I get in, fearing that the confinement may be rather too close for my liking. However, it is not a thing to be sneezed at. The money gathers so fast that ’tis thought we Childes shall have silver spoons by the time I enter the brotherhood. I like gentility, and I would give up a little roving for the sake of it.” “But how had you the luck to get on the list?” inquired Hunt. “Who befriended you?”