a mutton chop and some potatoes, as a home
dinner that would not give trouble. I pitied
Mrs. Tetherby and her little Eliza. Eliza,
who, as a premature maid of all work, had
by that time already fallen into a hopeless
state of dirt, brought me in fifteen minutes
a note from Mrs. Tetherby. It was a part
of my landlady's mind—connected, I think,
in some way with the piano—to be great in
notes beginning with "Mrs. Tetherby
presents her compliments to Mr. Batkinson." I
made a small collection of them in a corner
of my portmanteau. Mrs. Tetherby, upon the
hint of the mutton chop, presented her
compliments, and as she was unfortunately
without a servant, and unavoidably engaged upon
a heavy wash, would Mr. Batkinson object to
a cold dinner? What could I do in the face
of so polite an appeal? I dined, as I had
done before, upon cooked beef and bread.
So it went on. One of Mrs. Tetherby's children
fell sick, and there was no resisting the
pathos of the fact, that she required all the
time that she could get for nursing him. I
adhered, therefore, to cold beef from the
cookshop if I dined at home, and never got
even so much as a warm potato from the
kitchen. The sick child monopolized Mrs.
Tetherby. I got my water still in abundance,
and my little notes of apology in abundance:
in other respects, I was a disappointed man.
I did not become wrathful, for I well knew
that the sorrows of the landlady were greater
than the sorrows of the lodger. It is one
part of a lodger's trials that he has not only
his own cares to bear, but that he is
compelled to feel all the tribulations of the
people under whose roof he abides. I abided
manfully by the Tetherbys. Mr. Tetherby
was a stout man, who opened the door to me
sometimes, and never covered up his shirt
sleeves.

I left those people unwillingly, but the
course of my own private stream of life
floated me out of their rooms. An orphan
nephew was to live with me, and as I was no
longer to care only for myself, I required
more space, and different accommodation. So
I left the Tetherbys, but I received afterwards
in my next lodging a note, with a
border of the deepest black. It was from
Mrs. Tetherby, who hoped that if I could in
any way befriend her by recommendation of
her rooms, I would; for her husband, whose
business was in some way connected with
docks, had been for two years without
employment. Her little child had recovered
from the fever, but her eldest son, who had
been the main-prop of their house, had caught
it and was buried, she said, yesterday. I
knew then whose was the weary footfall that
would be heard never by any future lodger,
mounting after midnight from the street door
to the attic. Poor youth, and poor wan
mother! I went to her some weeks afterwards,
and found her rooms all empty. As
she had really a neat—and of course— clean
drawing-room floor, I recommended it to
certain friends who came for a short visit to
London, but some whim carried them into a
fashionable street, where they had chests of
drawers that would not open and shut, and
an accumulation of lodging-house miseries
provided for them on a costly scale. Perhaps,
however, had they gone to Mrs. Tetherby's,
they could not have dined peacefully upon
cold beef. Mrs. T. had another child ill at
the time, and difficulties about chops, to say
nothing of fish or joints, might have arisen.

Finding it rather heavy on my hands I
had by that time dropped the Suffolk poker,
and was concerned only for my own comfort
and that of my nephew. I should want two
bedrooms, and a pleasant sitting-room in
any healthy suburb, and I thought that for
an additional ten shillings a week I might
get what I wanted. I had a great search,
therefore, among three-roomed lodgings, and
inspected forty-seven before I could make
my choice. Out of the forty-seven only two
came up to my idea of wholesome cleanliness.
Let me say here, that in the course of my
struggles for rest as a lodger, I have
inspected several hundred lodgings of all kinds,
and in almost all parts of this metropolis.
They are governed by no rule whatever as
to the proportion between price and quality.
Lodgers are subject to a despotism, and the
taxes levied on them are entirely arbitrary.
The price and quality of apartments depend
much less on the size or situation of the
house than on the character and
circumstances of its owner.

My choice finally settled upon a lodging
in a pleasant, little, unfinished road, street,
or place in Camden Town. I had there a
drawing-room floor, and an extra bedroom,
for twenty-seven shillings a week, boots extra.
The front drawing-room made a tolerably
spacious bedroom, in which there was a
brass bedstead, an article of furniture wherein
I put much faith. The back drawing-room
made an agreeable sitting-room, which
contained not only a sofa, but also an easy chair,
and a little escritoire. Everything there was
perfectly clean and good. The rooms had
not been furnished for the use of lodgers.
My landlady being a widow with four children,
some of whom were old enough to
require schooling, had determined to let
lodgings that she might have wherewith to
pay the schoolmaster.

Nothing could be more laudable than Mrs.
Panther's determination. Albert Panther,
who appeared by his periodical screams to
be dipping his fingers about once an hour
in scalding water, was in great need of
improvement as a boy, and Mrs. Panther, rather
a handsome Amazon, anointed his wounds
vainly from the vials of her wrath. Sorrow
befel the servants also. About once a month,
and sometimes oftener, we were surprised
by the apparition of a metamorphosed maid
at breakfast-time. The house, however, had,