months, you know--that renders a stall indispensable. It’s the fashion to wear white kid gloves, and the whole of London comes off black on everything, so there’s a fine of 3s. 6d. a night only for having hands at the end of one’s arms. The atmosphere of the metropolis is composed chiefly of smoke--the only kind of smoke one can inhale without being choked is tobacco smoke; besides, life without cigars would be a desert without an oasis--but unfortunately Havannahs don’t hang on every hedge. I might multiply instances _ad infinitum_, but the thing is self-evident--to provide all these necessaries a man must possess money or credit, and I unfortunately have more of the latter than the former article. It is, as I have explained to you, utterly impossible for me to exist on less than--say £1500 a year; and even with my share of my poor mother’s fortune and the Governor’s allowance, my net income doesn’t amount to £800; _ergo_, half the London and all the Oxford tradesmen possess little manuscript volumes containing interesting reminiscences of my private life. It’s no laughing matter, I can assure you,” he continued, seeing Lewis smile; “there’s nothing cramps a man’s”--here he released a coat-tail in order to raise his hand to conceal a yawn--“augh! what do you call ’em?--energies--so much as having a load of debt hanging round his neck. If it hadn’t been for those confounded Oxford bills checking me at first starting, ’pon my word I don’t know that I might not have done something. I had ideas about a parliamentary career at one time, I can assure you, or diplomacy--any fool’s good enough for an _attaché_. Now, if I had that poor boy’s fortune, and he had my _mis_fortune, what an advantage it would be to both of us; he’ll never know what to do with his money, and I should--rather! Just fancy me with £10,000 a year, and a coat on my back that was paid for. By Jove, I should not know myself. Ah, well! it’s no use talking about it; all the same, I am an unlucky beggar.” “But,” interposed Lewis eagerly, “if you really dislike the life you lead so much, why don’t you break through all these trammels of conventionality and strike out some course for yourself? With £800 a year to ward off poverty, and the interest you might command, what a splendid career lies before you! Were I in your position, instead of desponding I should deem myself singularly fortunate.”