So the verse began, and it was illustrated by a flaring symbolical picture in two compartments. In the first a throng of gaunt and miserable creatures was represented crawling with difficulty towards an immense barrel, astride which sat a lusty, hop-crowned deity. In the second, every member of the same throng had become stout and hearty. The hollow cheeks were round and shining with health, the bent backs were straight, the dreary faces were wreathed in smiles, and every hand held a foam-topped glass of "Pellucid Ale." Underneath were painted the words, "After one glass." Even without the title, the inference was obvious; the confiding public drew it, and immense quantities of BULMER's ale, almost simultaneously, and the result was that, in a very short time, BULMER might have rolled in money if he had felt disposed--as, to do him justice, he never did--to render himself ridiculous. Now what is there in the fact that BULMER has made a fortune in beer that should inflate him to so insufferable an extent? Can it be that there is some mysterious property in the liquid itself, some property which, having escaped even the careful investigation of the analytical chemists, has pervaded the being of BULMER, and has induced him to patronise the inhabited world? I thought so once. Indeed I have lost myself in conjectures on this point. But I now know that BULMER has fallen under your sway, and that you, my dear POMPOSITY, direct his every movement, and inspire his every thought. Now, the other night, when, as I say, I was dining at his table, BULMER was in one of his most glorious and vain-glorious moods. Patronage radiated from him upon my humble self and the rest of the tribe of undoubted inferiors whom he permitted to bask in his shining presence. "My dear boy," said BULMER to me, while he inserted his thumbs in the arm-openings of his waistcoats, and drummed an approving tattoo upon his shining shirt-front, "my dear boy, I have always been your friend, and nobody knows it better than you. Many a time have I proved it to you, and I can honestly assure you that nothing gives me greater pleasure than to welcome you in person to my humble home."