Now be it known to you that his then study was the Universal Spelling Book (I believe he had it in his pocket at the time), in which is the story of the town in danger of being besieged. The mason, the currier, and the carpenter, give their opinion as to the best method of fortifying it, and each, of course, with an eye to self-interest. The mason recommends stone, the carpenter oak, and the currier leather. Well, at the instant of the shopkeeper’s and tailor’s deliberations on my wearables, Jimmy stood at the shop-door, staring up and down the street, as far as it was in his ken; and when the tailor appealed to him to know ‘what sort of inexpressibles did his masther ordher,’ honest Jimmy, thinking but of the ‘town in danger of being besieged,’ answered in the words of the currier, ‘take my word for it, there is _nothing like leather_.’ ‘Leather!’ echoed the shopkeeper. ‘Leather!’ screamed the tailor. ‘Ay,’ repeated Jimmy decidedly, ‘there is nothing like leather!’ Well! patience is a virtue. Were it not that the gentle spirit had made my half-starved frame her tabernacle, I should have been a tenant for Bedlam on the succeeding Saturday night, when the rascal Bryan brought himself and his green bag, with a sort of grin, into my parlour, and untying it, shook out before my amazed eyes a dashing pair of---- you shall hear _what_, presently. ‘They’re a very neat piece of work, Bryan,’ said I, examining them without much interest, thinking they could not possibly be for me; ‘they seem to be well seamed and stitched for aught I know, and I only hope for _your_ sake that they will fit him for whom you have made them.’ ‘I hope so too, sur,’ quoth the tailor, smirking complacently. ‘Be plaised to thry _them_ on sur, an’ I’ll engage they’ll fit to the peelin’ ov an ingin.’ ‘Pooh, pooh,’ returned I, good humouredly, still in the dark, ‘what use in _my_ trying them on? Indeed, if they had come in my way thirty years ago, and the _red rogue_ in full chase, I wouldn’t say but I’d pop them on, priest or no priest; but _now_ there’s no use in talking about them. Hand me out the _velvets_, and let me try _them_ on.’ ‘The _velvets_, yer rivirince?’ ‘Ay, the _velvets_, Sir Tailor; and I hope those you bring me now are roomier than the last pair.’ ‘Oh, faix, sur,’ cried the fellow, still shaking the _unmentioned unmentionables_ at me, ‘_those_ are roomy enough in all conscience, for I thought as how you wouldn’t like them _quite_ to the skin.’ And there _he_ stood, holding forth his wearables, and expatiating in their praise; and there _I_ stood expecting my _velvets_--but in vain! I caught up the bag, and turning it inside out, I found I had nothing more to expect--those forbidden ones were for ME! ‘What _colour_ are these in day-light?’ asked I, in that still calm that precedes the tempest. ‘An iligant yellow, sur!’ responded the stitcher with alacrity, his countenance brightening with hope.