"Measured for your harness--togs, you know?" "Not yet," I replied mildly--a martyr to information. "Nice time on it, you fellers has: plenty ter eat, plenty ter drink, nothing ter do, and plenty o' niste gals in the house. Got any guv'nor?" I replied in the negative. "Vell, then, young feller, you've put your foot into a good thing, and if you plays your cards right, you'll make a swell of yourself in just no time. Reg'lar swell, you know; keep yer own wally, private barber, and shoeblack brigade, yer know, to keep you all square--some one to swear at when yer outer sorts. Ony think; have yer chockely brought to you in bed; and then come down arterwards in a red dressin'-gownd with gold flowers on it, and a fancy cap with a big torsel! And there yer sits, big as a Lord Mayor, and has yer breakfass outer chany. Ah, it's a fine thing to be a swell, my lad! Arterwards yer goes out, fust chalk--all noo clothes--and when wun o' us pore chaps says, `Keb, sir!' `Yes!' sez you, and you goes down to yer club and reads the papers, and drinks champagne all day till dinner-time, when yer goes back to dinner with the missus, and finishes off every night by going to the oprer. Swell's life's a first-rate 'un, my lad. "Niste gals them missuses o' yourn. I should stick up ter the little 'un if I was you." [Mrs Scribe.] "I likes the looks on her. Can't say much for t'other. She's rayther too scraggy for my taste." [Miss Bellefille.] "Howsumever, it depends a good deal on which has most ochre. Though, mind yer, I wouldn't marry a gal altogether for her tin; I'd rayther hev a good-tempered fat 'un with six thousan' than wun o' yer thin, razor-backed, sour-tempered 'uns with twiste as much. Tain't no use havin heaps o' tin if yer can't enjoy it and do what yer likes. There's some chaps as I knows as is spliced and dursent say as their soul's their own; and no more durst send out for a pot o' porter than fly. Lor' bless you, every drop o' drink they swallers is 'lowanced out to 'em. Ony let the missus ketch 'em with the long clay and the backer, and then see how soon all the fat's in the fire. Gets told as they makes the parly curtains smell wuss nor a tap-room, and keeps a buzzin' about their ears till the pipe's reg'lar put out, and them too, werry often. "You take my adwice, young man, and don't you go and throw yourself away. Don't you go and make a martyr o' yourself, and get a ring o' bitter haloes round your head--sure sign o' rain, you know, and the wife's eyes a runnin' over. I rather takes to that little 'un inside, though; she looks good-tempered. I s'pose she ain't above five-and-twenty, is she?" I said I believed that was her age. "Good-tempered?" said Cabby; "don't shy the bread about if it's stale, or bully the gals, or any o' them sorter games?" "Oh, no!" I said.