Tejum's the doose, if you arsk me; and dulness does hoceans more 'arm than the pious ones reckon. It's jest when mernotony gives yer the 'ump that you're open to any bad biz as may beckon. Grey flatting constant will set you a longing to paint the town red, jest by way o' variety; Leastways, it's so with a Cabby, _I_ know, and no doubt it's the same in more toppin' Socierty. Ah! I remember old Kennington toll-gate afore 'twos removed Oh! the jams and the crushes! Once tooled down a fine F. O. clerk, young and smart, with the pootiest parcel o' blue silk and blushes, 'Amper O. K., Larrynargers _had libbitum_, fizz up to Dick, and a somethink _poetic_, Like laylocks, laburnums and mayblossom in it, as made me--a mere nipper then--symperthetic. To see 'im a whisking the dust from 'er bonnet, arf tender, arf sorcy, an' 'er a-purtending, To bridle up proud and becoming, was pooty. Whose money, thought I, my young nabs are _you_ spending. 'E parted like water, and backed 'em a buster; and blowed if _I_ shouldn't with them heyes upon me. Dunno if _'e_ spotted a winner. _I_ didn't! But 'ow they enjoyed it! 'Er smile reglar won me. When young 'uns is sweet 'uns, and sweet 'uns high-bred 'uns, it fetches me, somehow, to see 'em philander, They do it so dainty, an' sorter respekful. BILL BOGER, 'e says I'm a cackling old gander. All right, bilious BILLY! You've druv lovey-doveys of all sorts and ranks till you're verjuice an' sorrel, But these weren't no Monday Bank 'Oliday Mashers, or shop-sweet-hearts out on the scoop, _that's_ a moral. Well, close to the Stand a old heagle-beaked buffer was doing the nice to a dragful of toppers, And one 'awk-nosed duchess, as yaller as mustard, with hoptics suggestive of bile or 'ot coppers, Dropped lamps on _our_ little turn-out. Oh, Jemimer! I'm sure red-'ot needles was simply not in it, A savage old Pater, a jealous Miss GOLDBAGS, and--hus! Oh! I twigged the whole game in a minnit. Quite spiled my smart cab as a dove-cote that day. Druv 'ome rather late, and a trifle less cheerful, Him wondrous perlite, but,--well, wandering-eyed, an' 'er with the least little touch of the tearful. For me, I'd the 'ump, though 'e paid like a prince. Didn't see them again not till twenty year after; And then--well it gave me the doldrums somehow, though BILL BOGER declared that it moved _'im_ to laughter. _'E_ druv me and BILL to the Derby! We'd clubbed for a friendly drag down, BILL an' me, and some others, And poor young F. O. was our whip! 'E'd gone badgery slightly, along not of years but of bothers. _I_ knew _'im_ at once, and I think 'e twigged _me_; but 'e made ne'er a sign, only looked grave and civil. And when BILLY stood 'im a drink, 'e bowed low, just to 'ide what I guess was a flash o' the devil.