"Eugene, my boy," said the darker of the two, in a tone of voice loud enough to let half the room hear the interesting communication, "we must see what sort of stuff this here water is--we must, positively." "Roost eggs, Adolph, whisked in bilge-water, with a rusty tenpenny nail. Faugh! I'm smashed if I taste it." "Not so bad that for you," returned Adolph, smiling faintly; "but you must really pay your respects to the waters." "'Pon my soul, I shawn't. I had enough of that so't of thing in Jummany, the time I was ova with Ned Hoxham." "That was the time, wasn't it, that you brought me over that choice lot of cigaws?" "I believe it was," responded Eugene, with the most impressive indifference, as if he wished it to be understood that he had been so often there that he could not recall the particulars of any one visit. "I know something of Seidlitz and Seltzer myself," resumed the darker Adonis, "and soda water too, by Jove! for that matter, and they're not bad things either, when one's been making a night of it; so I'll have a try at this Potterwell fluid, and see how it does for a change." In this manner the two friends proceeded, to the infinite enlightenment of those about them, who, being greatly struck with their easy and facetious manners, stood admiringly by with looks of evident delight! The young men saw the impression they were making, and, desirous of keeping it up, went on to ask the priestess of the spring how often, and in what quantities, she found it necessary to doctor it with Glauber salts, brimstone, and assafœtida. The joke took immensely. Such of the bystanders as could laugh--for the internal agitation produced by the cathartic properties of their morning draught, made that a somewhat difficult and dangerous experiment--did so; and various young men, of no very definite character, but who seemed to support the disguise of gentlemen with considerable pain to themselves, sidled up, and endeavoured to strike into conversation with our Nisus and Euryalus, thinking to share by contact the glory which they had won. All they got for their pains, however, was a stare of cool indifference. The friends were as great adepts in the art and mystery of _cutting_, as the most fashionable tailor could be; and, after volunteering a few ineffectual efforts at sprightliness, these awkward aspirants to fame were forced to fall back, abashed and crestfallen, into the natural insignificance of their character.