The first of the series is also the best, and presents so many striking points for the consideration of the Magazine writer—(by which we mean merely to designate the writer of the brief and piquant article, slightly exaggerated in all its proportions) that we feel inclined to speak of it more fully than is our usual custom in regard to reprints of English light literature. Peter Snook, the hero, and the beau ideal of a Cockney, is a retail linen-draper in Bishopgate Street. He is of course a stupid and conceited, though at bottom a very good little fellow, and “always looks as if he was frightened.” Matters go on very thrivingly with him, until he becomes acquainted with Miss Clarinda Bodkin, “a young lady owning to almost thirty, and withal a great proficient in the mysteries of millinery and mantua-making.” Love and ambition, however, set the little gentleman somewhat beside himself. “If Miss Clarinda would but have me,” says he, “we might divide the shop, and have a linen-drapery side, and a haberdashery and millinery side, and one would help the other. There'd be only one rent to pay, and a double business—and it would be so comfortable too!” Thinking thus, Peter commences a desperate flirtation, to which Miss Clarinda but doubtfully responds. He escorts the lady to White Conduit House, Bagnigge Wells, and other “genteel” places of public resort—and finally is so rash as to accede to the proposition on her part of a trip to Margate. At this epoch of the narrative the writer takes occasion to observe that the subsequent proceedings of the hero are gathered from accounts rendered by himself, when called upon afterwards for certain explanations.