with an insolent drawl. "That's an amount of
boredom I could not submit to. Caution him
to make no blunder of that kind."

He looked up at me with a strange twinkle in
his eyes, which I could not interpret. He was
either in intense enjoyment of my smartness,
or Heaven knows what other sentiment then
moved him. At all events, I was in ecstasy at
the success of my newly discovered vein, and
walked the room, humming a tune, as he wrote
the letter that was to present me to his brother.

"Why had I never hit upon this plan
before?" thought I. "How was it that it had
not occurred that the maxim of homœopathy is
equally true in morals as in medicine, and that
'similia similibus curantur!' So long as I was
meek, humble, and submissive, Buller's impertinent
presumption only increased at every
moment. With every fresh concession of mine he
continued to encroach, and now that I had
adopted his own strategy, and attacked, he fell
back at once." I was proud, very proud of my
discovery. It is a new contribution to that
knowledge of life which, notwithstanding all my
disasters, I believed to be essentially my gift.

At last he finished his note, folded, sealed, and
directed it—"The Hon George Buller, A.D.C.,
Government House, Malta, favoured by Algernon
Sydney Potts, Esq."

"Isn't that all right?" asked he, pointing to
my name. "I was within an ace of writing
Hampden-Russell, too." And he laughed at his
own very meagre jest.

"I hope you have merely made this an
introduction?" said I.

"Nothing more; but why so?"

"Because it's just as likely that I never
present it! I am the slave of the humour I find
myself in, and I rarely do anything that costs
me the slightest effort." I said this with a close
and, indeed, a servile imitation of Charles
Mathews in Used Up; but it was a grand
success, and Buller was palpably vanquished.

"Well, for George's sake, I hope your mood
may be the favourable one. Is there anything
more I can do for you? Can you think of
nothing wherein I may be serviceable?"

"Nothing. Stay, I rather think our people
at home might with propriety show my old
friend Hirsch here some mark of attention for
his conduct towards me. I don't know whether
they give a C.B. for that sort of thing, but a
sum—a handsome sum—something to mark the
service, and the man to whom it was rendered.
Don't you think 'we' could manage that?"

"I'll see what can be done. I don't despair
of success."

"As for your share in the affair, Buller, I'll
take care that it shall be mentioned in the proper
quarter. If I have a characteristic—my friends
say I have many—but if I have one, it is that
I never forget the most trifling service of the
humblest of those who have aided me. You are
young, and have your way to make in life. Go
back, therefore, and carry with you the reflection
that Potts is your friend."

I saw he was affected at this, for he covered
his face with his handkerchief and turned away,
and for some seconds his shoulders moved
convulsively.

"Yes," said I, with a struggle to become
humble, "there are richer men, there are men
more influential by familiy ties and connexions,
there are men who occupy a more conspicuous
position before the public eye, there are men,
who exercise a wider sway in the world of
politics and party; but this I will say, that there
is not one—no, not one—individual in the
British dominions who, when you come to
consider either the difficulties he has overcome, the
strength of the prejudices he has conquered,
the totally unassisted and unaided struggle he
has had to maintain against not alone the errors,
for errors are human, but, still worse, the
ungenerous misconceptions, the—I will go further,
and call them the wilful misrepresentations of
those who, from education and rank and condition,
might be naturally supposed—indeed
confidently affirmed to be—to be——"

"I am certain of it!" cried he, grasping my
hand, and rescuing me from a situation very like
smothering—"I am certain of it!" And with a
hurried salutation, for his feelings were evidently
overcoming him, he burst away, and descended
the stairs five steps at a time, and although I
was sorry he had not waited till I finished my
peroration, I was really glad that the act had
ended and the curtain fallen.

"What a deal of bad money passes current in
this world," said I, as I was alone; "and what
a damper it is upon honest industry to think
how easy it is to eke out life with a forgery."

"What do you say to a dinner with me at the
Swan in Innspruck, Potts?" cried out Buller,
from the court-yard.

"Excuse me, I mean to eat my last cutlet
here, with my old gaoler. It will be an event
for the poor fellow as long as he lives. Good-by,
and a safe journey to you."

MR. CHARLES DICKENS
Will read on THURSDAY EVENING, March 14th, at St.
James's Hall, Piccadilly, his
CHRISTMAS CAROL AND THE BOOTS AT
THE HOLLY TREE INN.
Tickets to be had at Messrs. CHAPMAN and HALL'S,
193, Piccadilly; and of Mr. AUSTIN, Ticket Office,
St. James's Hall, Piccadilly.

On WEDNESDAY, 27th March, will be published,
price 5s. 6d., bound in cloth,
THE FOURTH VOLUME
OF
ALL THE YEAR ROUND.
Containing from Nos. 77 to 100, both inclusive, and
the Extra Double Number for Christmas.
The preceding Volumes are always to be had.