"And that every man is too much inclined to behave himself like a beast, In spite of our glorious humanity, which requires neither God nor priest, Yet is daily praised and plastered by ten thousand fools at least-- Request Mr. Hughes' presence at their jawshop in the East, Which don't they wish they may get it, for he goes out to-night to feast At the Rev. C. Kingsley's rectory, Chelsea, where he'll get his gullet greased With the best of Barto Valle's port, and will have his joys increased By meeting his old college chum, McDougal the Borneo priest-- So come you thief, and drop your brief, At six o'clock without relief; And if you won't may you come to grief, Says Parson Lot the Socialist Chief, Who signs his mark at the foot of the leaf--thus" and, at the end, a clenched fist was sketched in a few bold lines, and under it, "Parson Lot, his mark" written. I don't know that I can do better than give the history of the rest of the day. Knowing his town habits well, I called at Parker, the publisher's, after chambers, and found him there, sitting on a table and holding forth on politics to our excellent little friend, John Wm. Parker, the junior partner. We started to walk down to Chelsea, and a dense fog came on before we had reached Hyde Park Corner. Both of us knew the way well; but we lost it half a dozen times, and his spirit seemed to rise as the fog thickened. "Isn't this like life," he said, after one of our blunders: "a deep yellow fog all round, with a dim light here and there shining through. You grope your way on from one lamp to another, and you go up wrong streets and back again; but you get home at last--there's always light enough for that." After a short pause he said, quite abruptly, "Tom, do you want to live to be old?" I said I had never thought on the subject; and he went on, "I dread it more than I can say. To feel one's powers going, and to end in snuff and stink. Look at the last days of Scott and Wordsworth, and Southey." I suggested St. John. "Yes," he said, "that's the right thing, and will do for Bunsen, and great, tranquil men like him. The longer they live the better for all. But for an eager, fiery nature like mine, with fierce passions eating one's life out, it won't do. If I live twenty years I know what will happen to me. The back of my brain will soften, and I shall most likely go blind."