same price. I cannot, of course, be expected
to divulge the secrets of our account-books;
and it will be enough to say, that our rents
would command for each of us the sole possession
of a small house, in one of the streets
contiguous to our suburban square. We have
resigned the right of having our "house for
our castle," and we have the advantage of
airy, roomy dwellings, in the immediate
vicinity of the business and pleasure quarters
of the town.

At the bottom of the plan of our house,
there is a reasonable co-operative principle.
The houses of the great and wealthy of this
world are in the immediate vicinity of the
great squares and thoroughfares of the town;
they are conspicuous, easily accessible, and
their inmates avoid those long and wearisome
town travels, which those must undertake
who seek decent and comfortable quarters in
the suburbs. The houses of the great have
spacious halls and apartments, and commo-
dious, safe, and roomy stairs. None of our
purses, I believe, could command all these
advantages, if each of us desired to have his
''castle " to himself; but a rational spirit of
combination steps in, and supplies us with
all- with a situation near the centre of the
town, with large, comfortable rooms, and
magnificent stairs. Our house has all the
advantages of a great house, without its cares;
our porter (for we have a porter) maintains
its privacy; and the open door of our house
is more secure from intrusion than the heavy-
barred and brass-knockered doors of our
friends in other parts of London.

I said before that our house consists of
three stories. Of these each is divided into
two habitations of five rooms, that run from
the public stairs, by a most mysterious-looking,
dark polished door, with a bronze handle
and bell-knob at the side. A visitor ascends
the stairs (of which the windings form a large
shaft for ventilation), and demands admittance
to one of our habitations. A gentle pull at
the bell- a low soft ringing in some mysterious
locality within, and the door is immediately
opened by a comfortable servant,
whose cosey looks show that though fully
occupied, she is not overburdened with labour.
For the servants in our house have no door-steps
and stairs to clean. All this rough
work is taken from them by the porter. Then,
as for the interior, a single look will tell the
visitor how easy it must be to keep order in
a house which seems to be made for comfort
and cleanliness. As you look along the lofty
corridor (which receives its light from a large
window of painted glass, communicating with
the central shaft, which, in its turn, lets in a
flood of sunlight through a skylight on the
roof), you see the doors opening to the right
and left into the various sitting and sleeping
rooms; each door with its china handle and
finger-plates. Let him open the first door.
He will peep into a kitchen, fitted up in
splendid style, with massive shelves and
dressers, marble slabs, gas-burners, and all
fittings which do not usually belong to private
houses. For the dust and refuse, a door
communicates by means of an inclined plane
with the dust-shaft. The kitchen has its
water-pipes, and the range its gas-stoves.
Now let me praise our rooms. Exquisite
paper-hangings and costly fixtures everywhere!
Surely the landlord of "our house"
must be a very liberal man. Liberal, true!
but prudent also; for our house, with its six
families, pays double the rent which it would
be possible for him to obtain in any other
manner. It is an odd humour, but our land-
lord has a horror of "Chambers." It is his
ambition to build small houses in a large
house; and he lets them to none but families.
Bachelors have applied in vain: vainly have
spinsters exerted their powers of persuasion.
He remained obdurate; only the married and
the children would have roofs to cover them,
if all landlords resembled ours.

"But," asks a friend, "is the speculation
likely to answer?" It has answered beyond
the speculator's boldest hopes. Here we are
with our banisters unfinished, with our stairs
and corridors partially still in the possession
of workmen; here we are, people from various
parts of the town, each clinging to his allotment,
and preferring the necessary discomforts
of this domicile to the hearthstones
and door-steps of the Englishman's Castle.
But who are the tenants? Who should they
be but people whose avocations call them to
the centre of the town, whose means are too
small, or who are too prudent to live in houses
in Pall Mall or St. James's Square, who
detest lodgings, and who cannot live in the
Temple or Lincoln's Inn? There are thousands
of such in this large town; and there
will soon, I hope, be a dozen landlords who
will build for their use and comfort club-homes
such as that which I inhabit.

HOW TO BE AN EVERGREEN.

IF old Fitz-Baynard, of the Old Fellows'
lodge of Odd Fellows, would listen to my
advice- old man as I am- I could give him
a hint how to make himself a little less ridiculous
to our club. He looks like the choleric,
retired uncle, in all the farces at the Haymarket
Theatre. Doesn't he know that
his camlet roquelaire, with a poodle collar,
has been superseded, five outer-garments
deep? Its only merit is, that it hides that
absurd, sparrow-tailed, blue dress-coat, with
gilt buttons, which he is so fond of buttoning
tightly up to his chin. Five-and-twenty
years ago, he wore his coat stuffed
and wadded all over, like that, and close-buttoned
up, with the exception of the third
button from the top; where, to this day, he
stuffs in his crimson pocket-handkerchief,
which always hangs- accidentally, of course-
half out. But what is to hide that chimney-