"Is he to go?"

"Yes, he is. Had a good spell."

"That's true, but——"

"But what?"

"'Tis the first time—ever—you—we—–"

"Split. I know it," said his leader, fiercely.
"Bob, he did me an ill turn once. Besides, I'm
insulted. That fellow did the neatest thing of
the day, here, under our very noses, and without
a 'by your leave, my lord.' It has been the
business of my life to unite the recognised
courtesies of refined society with the sterner
exigencies of our profession. You don't
understand, my Bob. To put it simply: should we
have cracked a Liverpool crib without a word to
Jilling George? Bob, he goes. Tip the office."

"Very good," said Mr. Caunter, perfectly
resigned to his comrade's fate. "What was it
you said he's wanted about?"

"Thing in Jermyn-street, Humpage. Go you
to my brother, here's the address. Put him on
the trail. If he finds the man, he marries the
heiress. He'll reward."

"Hallo, stop. He'd no hand in it."

"Who?" demanded Lord Lob.

"Jilling George."

"Psha, 'tis no one else."

"Just what I was going to say."

"What?"

"'Tisn't nobody else."

"Neither George, nor nobody else? You don't
mean, that——"

"Yes, I do."

The two robbers looked at each other for a
moment, then burst into a fit of laughter that
almost infected the deaf "dubsman."

"Since when have you known this, Bob?"
asked Lord Lob.

"Week past."

"Can you put your hand upon him?"

"Know the doss-ken" (lodging).

"All right. Go to my brother, tell him everything,
as you would to me, and say I bade you
trust him for reward—and—and good-by, Bob,
my boy."

"O captain, here's a——" began Bob, relapsing
into tenderness.

"Vamoos, boy," said Lord Lob, hastily. "The
dubsman's scran's coming. Remember, your
captain was neither buzz-gloak, chaunter-cull,
nor sneaksman, never foxed, nor mooched, fit
cocum, nor faked a fadge, nor will he be at last
lagged for a ramp! The worst the patterer round
the government sign-post can say, will be that
Lord Lob was a leary gloak, and even that his
noble blood demanded. Wherefore, Robert, stow
whids, tip the jigger-dubber a tusheroon, clinch
daddles, and bing awast, my ben cull."

Translated from what may be called (at that
period) the language of Tyburnia into modern
Belgravian, the chieftain's farewell might be
rendered thus:

"You may retire, my friend. The turnkey's
evening meal is about to arrive. Recollect that
your leader was neither an appropriator of loose
cash, a writer of libellous and immoral songs,
nor a petty, cowardly shoplifter. He never
swindled, nor sponged upon his neighbours,
fought backwardly, nor filched a farthing. The
worst those street biographers, who throng
about the gallows, can say, will be, that Lord
Lob was a remarkably well-dressed individual,
a circumstance perfectly consonant with his high
birth. Wherefore, Robert, talk no more, hand
the turnkey a crown, shake hands, and begone,
my good fellow."

POPULAR NAMES OF BRITISH PLANTS.

"A NAME," according to Mr. John Stuart
Mill, "is a word (or set of words) serving the
double purpose of a mark to recal to ourselves
the likeness of a former thought, and a sign to
make it known to others." When the student
of words arrives at the origin and meaning of a
word, he finds a picture presented to his mind.
This picture is the likeness of the thought or
thing recalled or made known. Linnæus summed
up the universe into three kinds of names of things
—minerals, plants, and animals—and as these last
have the quality of life in common, everything
may be included under the words Stars and
Lives; and the languages or words of mankind
are marks and signs of their growing knowledge
of the universe. Knowing and naming have
gone on together from the origin of mankind to
the present time—from the first man who spoke
of the sun to the first man who made a sun
picture. Names, then, are images of the thoughts,
fossils of the theories, and medals of the history
of mankind. In names are to be found traces of
beliefs, feelings, suggestions, associations,
occurrences, whims, fancies, jokes—of every sort of
thing of which the mind is conscious in itself,
and all it perceives beyond it. Man, the animal
who has language, leaves in words the rich
legacy of all his acquisitions of knowledge. The
most ingenious researches have failed in
ascertaining anything reliable respecting the antiquity
of man, and the study of the relics of ancient life
has not yet discovered any milestones measuring
distance along the eternal road of time, but the
study of language is revealing to men of the
latter half of the nineteenth century many
things respecting the men of primeval times
whose bones became gases thousands of years
ago. The study of the names of plants, for
instance, tells us what men knew and thought
of them; where they saw them, or whence they
obtained them. When studying the popular
names of British plants, the darkness of the past
is not cleared up, the shades of our forefathers
are not made vivid as living forms; but trees and
shrubs, flowers and fruits, become luminous,
emitting glimmering lights, affording traces of
the wanderings and glimpses into the minds of
our forefathers, from recent back to the most
ancient times, or from the Victorian era to the
departure from the Asian Eden.