seemed to have been boiled or roasted.
Mrs. Vamper boiled a piece of beef as she
would have boiled a lodger—furiously, to the
death, and to the bone. It used to come up
about as eatable as India rubber. It was a
thing to make a housewife cry, and a husband
scold, to see how the joint looked after
Mrs. V. had set her fire to blaze upon it.
But we did not scold. Mrs. Batkinson did
indeed look at a dish sometimes through tears;
but, on the whole, we succumbed, since, in.
reply to my wife's gentle—her, unluckily,
too gentle—expostulation, Mrs. Vamper only
declared fiercely, that it would be odd indeed
if she did not know how to cook a joint of
meat. And so it was odd. We, after a few
more hints and objections, took the oddity
for granted, and smiled at the joke in a
sickly way over our dinners.

Still we had a delightful prospect from the
window, and said Mrs. Batkinson, "My dear
Philander, bear in mind the boxes. We have
so many things to move that it will take a
month out of the year to unsettle ourselves
here, and settle down again into another
lodging. The prospect out of doors is beautiful,
and indoors there are famous cupboards.
"What" (said the housewife) "shall we ever do
without those cupboards?"  We entertained
therefore no rebellious thoughts of moving,
for I would not give my Rosalinda trouble.
We submitted to the tyranny of Mrs. Vamper.

Only once did that good lady come upstairs
to exercise her energies on our behalf. A
workman engaged in repairs upon the chimney
of an adjoining house, had, as it appeared,
found the smoke of our own chimney close at
his elbow disagreeable. He had therefore
quenched the nuisance by sitting upon the
nozzle of our chimney pot. The consequences
indoors were tremendous, and Mrs. Vamper
having traced the effect to its cause flew up
and downstairs, screaming up at the man
from back windows with so much vivacity,
that he repeated his joke several times during
the afternoon for the pure love of the
entertainment she afforded.

Mrs. Vamper's servants, I need not say,
were as often shifted as the scenes in a
pantomime. In a house tenanted by lodgers
servants always come and go. The average
length of service by one person is, if I may
trust my own experience, less than six weeks.
Mrs. Vamper's servants became with every
change smaller, and it was evident that she
was cutting down her wages. We at last
came to a domestic of the age of ten. The
natural hostility between landlady and lodger,
as between tiger and lamb, was evidenced at
every change by the strong prejudice against
us evidently planted in the minds of all new
servants and remaining there for the first
week of service, and by the obvious wrath
and jealousy awakened afterwards in Mrs.
Vamper's breast against each maid when she
discovered—as they all discovered in their
turn—the difference between that lump of
mustard, Mrs. V., and my mild little Suffolk
dumpling.

In course of time hints from successive
servants had warned Mrs. Batkinson of a
vindictive feeling entertained downstairs
against an unborn heir of all the Batkinsons
whose advent was to be expected in the
spring. Mrs. Vamper could not see what
people wanted with babies. She hated them.
She had a daughter in Van Dieman's Land,
but babies she abhorred. A lodger when he
has a baby wants to make his rooms into a
home, and in so doing outrages the first
principles that govern his condition. Mrs. Vamper
became more tyrannical than ever. Little
Mrs. Batkinson. was perfectly put down, and
snubbed on every occasion. She made fewer
puddings, because she was seized and morally
tortured whenever she came within her reach.
She trembled whenever the sound of the
harsh voice of Mrs. Vamper grated up the
stairs.

I had long urged removal on account of
these impertinences. The van-load of things
that must be packed so that they would not
crack, crush, or crumple, caused Mrs.
Batkinson always to beseech that I would do
nothing so rash. The tiger, however, one day
snarled so ferociously at my lamb, in my own
hearing, that I said, "We must go. This
slavery can be endured no longer." I put
on my hat at once, and wandered out on a
wild search for other lodgings.

I had not visited more than about eighteen,
when I found at Notting Hill a pretty little
drawing-room, scented with blooming hyacinths,
pleasantly furnished; and over it was a
light and airy bedroom, with a dressing-room
attached, and all were to be had for a guinea
a week. They were in a pleasant cottage-
house, with a garden, in a good road. And
what was better still, the house was situated
at the end of the bricks, four doors from the
fields. It was not a lodging house. The
place had been taken, and well furnished, by
a young couple who, after a few months, had
found it necessary to assist their housekeeping
with a lodger. We undertook to be their
first tenants, and expected to remain with
them it might be for years, or it might be
for ever. At last, we thought, our rolling
stone would rest a bit and gather moss.

Every attention was paid to us. One of
the first things that happened was the
discharge of the adult servant and the engagement
in her place of a little girl. "Temporary,"
said Mr. Poolby. But it soon appeared that
Mr. Poolby's private affairs were embarrassed,
and that the little girl was to be
retained, from prudential motives, as a
permanent domestic. We were glad of that;
any trouble can be got over with energy and
prudence. We could complain of or desire
to hinder nothing of the kind, and any falling
off in the attendance we received did not
distress us in the least. Mrs. Poolby did her
best, and Mr. Poolby, who was a fig-dealer