"Reporthers have harder work now then they had whin I first went in the Gallery," said old Dawson. "Me father, as yez know, boys, was a reporther before me; and I might say it runs in the family. Ah! thim were good times, boys, when the ould man did his short-hand wurruk. He knew all the great reporthers of the day; and fine fellows they were, too. There was William Radcliffe, the husband of the woman who wrote all the bloodthirsty novels. Radcliffe was a mimry reporther, and he'd go to the House and sit the debates out, and nivir take a note at all, at all. Then he'd go to the office and dictate two different articles at a time to the juniors who took it all down, and out it came, sphick-and-sphan, in the morning, without a flaw. "Then there was another grate fellow, ould Billy Woodfall, who had a paper of his own called the _Diary_; and that was before the House allowed the reporthers to take notes during the debates. They used to call him "Mimory Woodfall," because he'd never forget anything that he had heard; and when strangers would come from the country to visit the House the first questions they would ask would be, 'Which is Woodfall?' 'Which is the Sphaker?' Me fawther told me many a story about him. He had a fashion of bringing hard-boiled eggs with him, which he carried in his hat, and whin he came to the House he'd take off his hat carefully, put it between his knees, take the eggs out, keeping his head well down for fear the Sargint-at-Arrums would see him eating, and then he'd brake the shells and eat the eggs with as great relish as if they were game pies. A reporther on an opposition paper wanted to play a joke on Billy one night, and when he laid his hat down he took the two hard-boiled eggs out and put two in the hat that had nivir been boiled at all, and when Billy wint to crack the shells the yoke sphattered all over his breeches, bedad, so it did. Billy nivir forgave the joke until the day of his death. Woodfall did all his own reporthin', and the _Diary_ did well for a time, until the _Morning Chronicle_ started in opposition, with Perry at the head of it. Perry hired a lot of reporthers to take notes of the debates and write them out, and by the time that Woodfall had his notes written out, the _Chronicle_ was selling in every sthreet in London; and that was what took all the wind out of poor Billy's sails."