_Slowgoe._ Ha! you’re a cuss-of-liberty man, you are, Mr Tickle, and don’t know what befits the royal prerogative. They won’t want a shilling, sir--not a shilling. There’s the Pavilion at Brighton. I understand that the loyal people of that loyal town, out of love, and affection, and veneration for their monarch as a king, a man, a husband, a father, and--let me see--yes, a practical moralist, intend to purchase the Pavilion, and let it off in shops for jewellers, wig-makers, and tailors, and all as a monument to the memory of that great and good man George the Fourth. _Tickle._ Well, to make the monument complete, I hope they won’t forget a wine and brandy vaults. _Nutts._ But how about the Duke’s statue? I thought it was to be put up upon the gate, that the Queen might see it when she drove out. Now, if the Queen has a new house on Buckbeen Hill---- _Tickle._ Why, all the houses ’tween that and Rutland Gate will be pulled down, that the statue may be brought near to the new palace with a telescope. _Slowgoe._ I’m very happy to see that her Majesty, and the Prince, and the children are taking such pleasure on the sea. _Tickle._ Yes. Parson M’Neile--he isn’t yet a bishop, I hear---- _Nutts._ Why, no; but as they say there’s going to be a bishop made for Manchester, and as he’s at Liverpool, so very near the spot, he keeps himself prepared for the best. They do say he sleeps with his carpet-bag and shovel-hat by his bedside, all in readiness for an early train. _Tickle._ A very provident parson. Well, they say he preached another sermon last Sunday about the Prince and his doings. In fact, it is reported that he intends to follow up his Royal Highness through the _Court Circular_. Last Sunday he compared him to Noah. _Nutts._ As how? _Tickle._ Why, because his Royal Highness was afloat in the royal yacht. Bless you! he showed how the Prince was Noah, and how the _Victoria and Albert_ was nothing more than the ark, holding the hopes of the world; and how the precious children were Ham, Shem, and Japheth, and how the ark held two of every living thing. _Tickle._ Well, I can’t say about that; but if Parson M’Neile told men all the beasts in the ark was, St Jude’s could answer for one of the “creeping things.” [Illustration] [Illustration] CHAPTER V. _Tickle._ (_With newspaper._) Well, it’s a shocking thing, isn’t it, when we read of babbies, left by things as call themselves their mothers, on highways and door-steps, and in all sort of places, exposed, I b’lieve they call it, to the elements and the severity of the season. It’s a little bad o’ such parents, isn’t it, Mr Nutts? _Mr Nutts._ Bad! that isn’t the word, Mr Tickle; and the worst of it is, we can’t make a word bad enough for it.