_Mr. Cocker. (with warmth)._ There's room enough in PORPENTINE'S passage for a whole host of hatstands, if that's all, and I know what I'm speaking about. I've been in and out there often enough. I'm--ah--a regular tame cat in that house. But if you're against the 'atstand, I say no more--we'll waive it. How would it do if we gave him a nice comfortable easy-chair--something he could sit in of an evening, y' know? _Mr. Sibb._ A touchy chap like PORPENTINE would be sure to fancy we thought he wanted something soft after a hard bench and a plank bed--you can't go and give him _furniture_! _Mr. Cocker. (with dignity)._ There's a way of doing all things. I wasn't proposing to go and chuck the chair _at_ him--he's a sensitive feller in many respects, and he'd feel _that_, I grant you. He can't object to a little present of that sort just from four friends like ourselves. _Mr. Balch. (with a falling countenance)._ Oh! I thought it was to be a general affair, limited to a small sum, so that all who liked could join in. I'd no notion you meant to keep it such a private matter as all that. _Mr. Filk._ Nor I. And, knowing Mr. PORPENTINE so slightly as I do, he might consider it presumption in me, making myself so prominent in the matter--or else I'm sure---- _Mr. Cocker._ There's no occasion for anyone to be prominent, except myself. You leave it entirely in my 'ands. I'll have the chair taken up some evening to PORPENTINE'S house on a 'andcart, and drop in, and just lead up to it carelessly, if you understand me, then go out and wheel the chair in, make him try it--and there you _are_. _Mr. Balch._ There _you_ are, right enough; but I don't see where _we_ come in, exactly. _Mr. Filk._ If it's to be confined to just us four, I certingly think we ought _all_ to be present at the presentation. _Mr. Cocker._ That would be just the very thing to put a man like PORPENTINE out--a crowd dropping in on him like that! I know his ways, and, seeing I'm providing the chair---- _Mr. Balch. (relieved)._ You are? That's different, of course; but I thought you said that we four---- _Mr. Cocker._ I'm coming to that. As the prime mover, and a particular friend of PORPENTINE'S, it's only right and fair I should bear the chief burden. There's an easy-chair I have at home that only wants re-covering to be as good as new, and all you fellers need do is to pay for 'aving it nicely done up in velvet, or what not, and we'll call it quits. _Mr. Balch._ I daresay; but I like to know what I'm letting myself in for; and there's upholsterers who'll charge as much for doing up a chair as would furnish a room. _Mr. Filk._ I--I shouldn't feel justified, with my family, and, as, comparatively speaking, a recent resident, in going beyond a certain limit, and unless the estimate could be kep' down to a moderate sum, I really----