of establishments repaired to by fair and noble
clients of the higher classes.  Shylock, Sir, did
not imply a bargain more ruthless; but I yielded:
since to the power of the Press I have been
always implicitly dismissive; and thus l humbly
trust that your electric beam will make that
insidious blighter of hopes by false expedients
wither a second time (as at Belshazzar's Feast), be
the glare of his prosperity ever so transcendent.

For some weeks, almost up to the point of a
quarter, the halcyon Peace presided; and the
Orb and the Emporium moved in intimate
harmoniousness. Mings, he is not much of a author, and
in Epithets of Taste, he was for ever coming
backwards and forwards, pretending that Millinery
was alien to his horizon, and applying
copiously to Madmysel Claire for exactitude in terms.
Our assistant was more down than up-stairs;
just then, circumstances, which crown matrimonial
life, making it expedient for my wife to
refrain from extraneous publicity; and so, to
distract curiosity, it was denounced in the Arcade,
and advertised in the Orb of Fashion, that the
extensiveness of the Emporium, also to establish
foreign agents, would necessiate Madmyselle
Mireille to repair to Paris; Madmyselle Claire
(and our assistants up-stairs) conducting the
business during her departure. The advantages
taken of this attitude of events by yonder black
and twining serpent, would baffle a catalogue.
It was not solely being backwards and forwards
for epithets; but at meal-times on every possible
occasion. The tea and muffins he drank, would
fill a volume; and did the muffins fail to be
fresh, Mings began to look gloomy, and state
that the Orb of Fashion had been strictured on
by malignant opponents, for showing
indiscretional favours to this Emporium. Other
Arcades, to hear him talk, was pressing in their
advancements on his pen. How little could I
dream that his Orb was verging on its last legs.
Just then, secure as the Mariner of the Sea, who
lies becalmed above a couch of coral, I was
concentrating on Hamlet for Mr. Titiens Pink's
great picture; so that you, Sir, who have seen it,
and therefore have admitted as you must, that
here was no milk-and-water Royal Dane, such
as foreign versions have deluded old England's
metropolis to subscribe in,—must be equal the
same, aware that the fire of frenzy luminating
and sparkling from my eyes, was no easy mood
to assume for hours at a sitting, on five mornings
out of six (and sometimes, to be candid, on
Sunday afternoons), especially on the part of
one, whose criterion of character has always
been confessed to be amenity.

I say, Sir, I dreamed delusively, that the
alliance was sound, and the Orb and the Emporium
flourishing like twin sisters of the soul. My
wife, Sir, she was more early awake to the
mysteries veiled by the curtain of serpentine audacity.
But this I subscribed to the irritability
of her predicament; and did she protest against
such a profusion of visitations and objection
respecting muffins, on the part of Mings,—alert
to pacify, "Mary," I would say, "recollect how
our joint interests, aided by them papers, is
flourishing,—and the proud position of the
Emporium, especially since our recent inventions."

For the Emporium had been copious and
fertile. I will only name three, to each of which
the disquisitions in the Orb of Fashion, Mings
declared, had caused the palm of success to fall.
The SWEET HAT, decked with primroses and
other artless weeds, fit for the use of the young;
but which was seized with such ardour, that
there was eight middle-aged gentlewomen wearing
spectacles, in the Emporium at once,
mutually pushing, and using rude terms, in order
to secure the first choice. The STRONG-MINDED
VADE-MECUM, destined for those lonely tourists
of the sex, to whom self-protection is more
apposite than absorption by male flatteries. This,
too, had its hour, mostly among the dissenting
classes; Quakers, even, who, as my wife used
to say, must be sick of confinement to dreary
coal-boxes. The ROYAL NON-PAREIL, which her
Gracious Majesty had expressed she had never
seen anything to compare with it. Two days
after that sentence was promulgated in the Orb,
the Emporium was inundated by a commission
from Hull and other districts; and six cases was
despatched within the week. Madmysel Claire,
because of the stress, included she was obliged to
stand out for double salary;—which being
demurred, she declared her plan of writing a letter
to the Orb, also to the Society for Cruelty to
Animals. (I have since had cause to ascertain
that her rapacious course was prompted by that
adder in male form.) Loth as is every generous
heart to succumb, be the crisis ever so impendent,
caution and my wife's prospects kicked the beam.
We acceded, and Madmysel Claire received her
ill-gotten gains. It may have been a mercy that
the run on the ROYAL NON-PAREIL sunk into the
sand as rapidly as it had originated.

What boots it? Prospects smiled; and who
but a snake such as he, could enter into the
yawning volcano beneath our feet? It now
was but a week, when my wife's departure to
Paris (which in reality Paddington) was to
take place, and she and Madmysel Claire had
invariable preliminaries to operate, during this
period of my partner's abstinence, when our
assistant was to take the ruling part.

"Timothy," said my wife, at the close of one
of their committees in union. "Flesh and blood
can stand such no longer. The Emporium will
crumble unless rescued; and as I know you
are a poor chicken-hearted creature, I have
written to him to tell him to desist. Pillaged
I, and the child that is unborn, will not be;
whatever their Orbs may say and do."

"Mary," was my reply, "don't excite hysterics,
which is of serious importance as you are.
Pillagers cannot exist in the Arcade—during
three beadles parade it, as you are aware, till
closing time."

"Timothy," she broke out (of late her temper
had been more boisterous than elegant), "if you
are a goose, out with it like a man! And you
are a goose or you would have defended your
lawful wife against the pillagement of that
speedy and ill-conditioned sponge—that