argument, and in the plasticity of my nature, as
to believe that she will yet, one day, induce me
to give up the study of profane literature, and
embrace a saving faith in the tenets of Warm
Water Baptism (Peckham Branch—New
Connexion), of which comparatively obscure
religious persuasion the old lady is an active
supporter?

Muffin, indeed! Why, the before-mentioned
Totty, barely six-and-three-quarters, has been
advising me for the last fortnight to shave off
my whiskers! Surely, I am as good a judge of
manly beauty as Totty. And, for that matter,
I should think I know as well what is necessary
for the conduct of a work of fiction as my
brother-in-law John Slogginson, who, though
twenty-eight years of age, has not yet succeeded
in acquiring the rudiments of any lucrative
profession, and who, but for a little really well-
grounded information on the subject of rats and
terriers, with some practical knowledge of the
noble art of self-defence, might be pronounced a
monumental prodigy of ignorance in general.
Yet John is at me fiercely day after day, with
truculent counsel to alter the contemplated
catastrophe of a romance I am writing in the
Hair-on-End Magazine; and if I adhere to my
original design, which I still think a good
one, I am by no means sure that he will not
punish my disobedience with a thrashing. I
doubt if John ever read a work of fiction
in his life till he took mine under his patronage
for the especial discomfiture of its author. I
am sure he would not venture to express an
opinion on the works of any other living writer.
But he edits me, cruelly and remorselessly. He
commands alterations as if I were his tailor, and
my story his coat. And he employs no false
delicacy in conveying his objections. His
manner of criticism is in this wise: "I tell you
what, Joe, if you don't alter that precious slow
chapter, you are a bigger fool even than I took
you for;" or, "You don't mean to let this scene
stand as it is, do you? You can please yourself,
of course, but if you want my candid opinion"
(which I never did in my life), "it's downright
rot. And there you have it."

Mr. Slogginson advises me not merely on my
literary achievements, but also on my private
affairs—pecuniary, sartorial, and hygienic. Mr.
S. has been chronically insolvent since I had the
honour of forming his alliance, but he is very
hard on me indeed when I myself get a little
behindhand with the world. He told me,
savagely, the other day, that if he ever heard of me
putting my name to another bill (I have backed
John's own not easily negotiable paper before
now), he would feel himself tempted to administer
to me the severe moral lesson of knocking my head
against the wall; after which he borrowed half-a-
crown, and went out to spend the evening.
John is not what you would call a good dresser,
his washerwoman maybe said to enjoy something
very like a sinecure; but he insists rigorously
that I shall be uniformly neat and unobtrusive
in my attire. I started a wide-awake of rather
eccentric pattern last summer. John
immediately sequestrated that covering, remarking
that I should not make a public exhibition of
myself while it was in his power to prevent it.
John wears the hat to this day! I met him at
a party last Christmas, and very well he looked
indeed in my best white waistcoat and
penultimate dress trousers. I was rather satisfied
with my own personal appearance too, having
taken especial pains with the tie of my cravat.
I had scarcely entered the room, when John
passed me, exclaiming, in an angry,
authoritative whisper, backed by a cruel frown, "Do
go home and take that thing off. Are you mad?
The people are staring at you." I attempted a
beard once, on the occasion of a severe sore-
throat; but, this was a liberty John could not
and would not put up with. I shaved, and was
forgiven.

Very particular about my health, too, is John
Slogginson. He has a philosophic disregard for
his own; in fact, I have had to nurse him
through two attacks of delirium tremens. He
will not let me eat anything I like. If he finds
me rather bilious, and complaining, any morning,
he growls, in ursine tones, "Ugh! smoking
again, I suppose? If you will kill yourself I
can't help it." After which he borrows my pen-
knife to cut up his Cavendish. If I take him
out to a dinner party (an error I have more than
once been advised into committing), he
ruthlessly puts me in a cab, just as the claret and
conversation are beginning to circulate, and
returns to finish the evening. I have found
it no isolated experience to receive feverish
tidings from him the next morning, dated from
a remote and inaccessible station-house.

I am a married man, or I should not be blessed
with a brother-in-law. This fact acknowledged,
it will be perhaps superfluous to state, after what
I have already stated of myself, that my wife
favours me with frequent and liberal supplies of
the commodity in question. Mrs. Drilling may,
in fact, be pronounced the Première or Prime
Ministress of my Majesty's Council of Advisers.
The advice is uniformly good, but difficult of
adoption. I am not quite sure that she ever
actually advised me to be six feet high (I stand
five feet ten in my stockings), or to alter my
natural saturnine complexion to a florid and
sanguine tint; but her advice is usually of that
practicable character. She is for ever advising
me to write a work, that shall secure for me
such emolument and consideration as have been
awarded to the writings of Mr. Phœbus
O'Pollough, the eminent Hibernian novelist; or to
dash off a five-act play, something in the style
of the eminently successful dramatist, Sir Hugh
Rippidies. If I could only just bring my mind
to do this, she very sensibly urges—at the same
time emulating the domestic regularity of our
friend Mr. Thurtell Dove, combining therewith
the business aptitude of our thriving City
acquaintance Mr. Baring Bull—we should be so
happy! It is capital advice, undoubtedly.

I have still, I am happy to say, an affectionate
mother. She is marvellously fond of, and I am
afraid exorbitantly proud of, me. But, her fondness