Returning to Piccadilly we pass into the regions that branch away, Duke Street, Bury Street, King Street, and the rest, and enter Bachelor Land, where every old house has been furbished up, and made to take the shape of apartments for gentlemen. The class of persons who lodge here are notoriously _exigeant_--old gentlemen coming to town to enjoy themselves, and requiring all their comforts to precede them. Apartment letting here, therefore, becomes almost scientific, and would astonish the rude operators elsewhere. The retired butler and retired lady’s maid, who have joined their fortunes, “work like horses.” The grandfather of Brummel, the dandy, was a retired servant of Lord Liverpool’s, and kept one of these lodging houses in Bury Street. Here, in King Street, is Christie’s--which has been, however, more disastrous than Crockford’s to many an artistic gull. Never can be forgotten the ridiculous displays at one or two of the famous picture sales five or six years ago. Within the last twenty years there have been great days at “Christie’s,” when on the “view” days the streets were blocked with carriages, and the _dilettanti_, in a sort of mad fervour, gaped, and raved, and bid for works whose value is now admitted to be about a quarter of what was then paid. Not to be forgotten was the spectacle and pressure of the perspiring, enthusiastic, and ignorant dowager, with her daughters, pushing her way round and staring at the works; and the grave, subdued excitement of the courteous administrators of the place, who felt how much was at stake. There were other field days, when the noble Dudley contended for the great Sèvres jars and won them at ten thousand guineas. It would also be a history of human folly, and infatuation of cracked amateurs, who nibbled away their fortune, in confidence of their own precious judgment, when all they bought was to “fetch double hereafter.”