or vice versa--is beyond my record; seeing that I was just then removed from the scene of contest, to be introduced into that Universal School where, as in the preparatory ones, we have very unequal shares in the flogging, the fagging, the task-work, and the pocket-money; but the same breaking-up to expect, and the same eternity of happy holidays to hope for in the Grand Recess. In brief, a friend of the family having taken a fancy to me, proposed to initiate me in those profitable mercantile mysteries which enabled Sir Thomas Gresham to gild his grasshopper; and like another Frank Osbaldestone, I found myself planted on a counting-house stool, which nevertheless served occasionally for a Pegasus, on three legs, every foot, of course, being a dactyl or a spondee. In commercial matters, the only lesson imprinted on my memory is the rule that when a ship’s crew from Archangel, come to receive their L. S. D., you must lock up your P. Y. C. [Illustration: THE WINNER OF THE LEDGER.] [4] In spite of hundreds of associates, it has never happened to me, amongst the very many distinguished names connected with science or literature, to recognise _one_ as belonging to a school-fellow. [Illustration: SHOOTING WITH ROVER AND RANGER.] SHOOTING PAINS. “The charge is prepared.”--MACHEATH. If I shoot any more I’ll be shot, For ill-luck seems determined to star me, I have march’d the whole day With a gun--for no pay-- Zounds, I’d better have been in the army! What matters Sir Christopher’s leave? To his manor I’m sorry I came yet! With confidence fraught, My two pointers I brought, But we are not a point towards game yet! And that gamekeeper too, with advice! Of my course he has been a nice chalker, Not far, were his words, I could go without birds: If my legs could cry out, they’d cry “Walker!” Not Hawker could find out a flaw,-- My appointments are modern and Mantony, And I’ve brought my own man, To mark down all he can, But I can’t find a mark for my Antony! The partridges,--where can they lie? I have promised a leash to Miss Jervas, As the least I could do; But without even two To brace me,--I’m getting quite nervous! To the pheasants--how well they’re preserved! My sport’s not a jot more beholden, As the birds are so shy, For my friends I must buy, And so send “silver pheasants and golden.” I have tried ev’ry form for a hare, Every patch, every furze that could shroud her, With toil unrelax’d, Till my patience is tax’d, But I cannot be taxed for hare-powder. I’ve been roaming for hours in three flats In the hope of a snipe for a snap at; But still vainly I court The percussioning sport, I find nothing for “setting my cap at!”