and of course after the departure of his
reflector:

We will confine ourselves to saying, that
the same awful suggestion was once made in
connection with the elucidation of another
social problem of a similar nature, by Mrs.
Betsey Prig, over pickled salmon, in the
apartment of Mrs. Gamp, but in that case the
elucidator was under the influence of spirits.
If this be the very truth; if our friend's
friend have in reality no existence, except in
the scheming brain of his confederate and
originator, we have been victims indeed. He
has taxed our belief, and imposed upon our
credulity to a greater extent than any superstition
of the darkest ages ever ventured upon
with the most savage mind. His attributes,
which have been of the most impossible kind,
we have never so much as questioned; his
exploits, before which those of Munchausen
pale, we have listened to, if not with entire
faith, at least with courteous attention.
When, years ago, we were told that our
friend's friend was at once a practical
Christian and a Palace Court attorney,
we exhibited no distrust; when we were
assured that he was a family man, living
on three hundred a year, and yet keeping his
carriage and pair without driving into debt,
we only remarked that it deserved the
name of Economy's Triumphal Car. What
if we had been made to do all this, and
more, by a Creature of Mythology, a non-
existence, a Mrs. Harris, of no parts and
of no magnitude! The idea is indeed
humiliating. At all events, we hereby publish
our protest against our friend's friend,
whether he be in the spirit, or whether he be
in the imagination only. When a man
marries a living woman's daughter, he knows
that the elder female will be henceforth his
mother-in-law, and makes up his mind beforehand
to resistance or to submission. The
object—sometimes the person—of his antagonism
is plain, and (generally) substantial, and
he has seen it in all its length and breadth
from the beginning.

Again,—to take a still stronger case,—when
a gentleman marries a widow, he is aware that
certain comparisons will be drawn at certain
times from the silent tomb, and cast at him,
decidedly to his disadvantage, from which it
will be difficult, if not impossible, to shelter
himself—spectral virtues, which no exorcism
of his can ever lay. Still, he puts his head
into a tangle of widows' weeds with his eyes
open; and, if the gods have not wished to
ruin him and made him mad beforehand,
he soon finds out how unpleasantly tight
a matrimonial noose of that material can
be drawn. In the choice of our friend,
however, no foresight of this kind can be
used, and therefore the strictest watch
should be kept against his first introduction
of that ghostly enemy his Friend, of
whom we have been thus discoursing. ''Love
me, love my dog," is a proverb whose meaning
is well understood enough; but it has
never yet been applied in words to the
human subject. As we say, 'ware the dog!
so with ten times the reason should we
write up at the entrance-gate of our affections:
No admittance to our friend's friend: all
applications to be made in person.

CHIPS.
HOW TO MAKE A MADMAN.

EMANUEL MILKYWAY, for many years a punctual
payer of Queen's taxes, renter of a family
pew in the Church of Saint Lucre the Great;
a policy-holder in the Jupiter Life Office;
a depositor in the Saint Lucre Parochial
Savings' Bank; a subscriber to the fund for the
proper teaching of astronomy in the islands
of the Pacific; honorary secretary of the
Benevolent Whitewashing Association for
the extermination of bugs and black beetles
in the cottages of the poor; senior clerk in
the old and substantial banking-house of
Messrs. Tic, Doloreux, and Company; paragon
of respectability, essence of regularity,
quintessence of propriety and careful conduct
—you are taken into custody by a highly
intelligent and active member of the metropolitan
police force upon a charge of murder
and highway robbery. You did not do it?
You are utterly incapable of perpetrating
such a crime? Perhaps so; but we shall see,
You answer to the description of the criminal,
for whose apprehension a reward of two
hundred guineas is offered by the Right
Honourable the Secretary of State for the
Home Department; and two witnesses and
one policeman can swear to your identity.
You are so respectable? No doubt of it, but
very respectable people have their moments
of weakness, and their criminal impulses. It
is a painful duty that I have to perform, and
I am bound to caution you that what you
say to me will be taken down in evidence
against you.

Emanuel Milkyway, you are a safe prisoner
in a close, damp, dark station-house. By
giving an officer, not on duty, five shillings,
you communicate to your distressed family
the reason that you are not with them as
usual to partake of supper. They are not
allowed to see you that night, but early the
next morning through the bars of a cage at
the police-court, you can hold out one finger
to your poor wife, who is blinded by her
tears. In a few minutes you are taken to
the Police Court to undergo your preliminary
examination before the sitting magistrate.
Certain evidence is put in; and your solicitor,
who is there, can do nothing more at so short
a notice than apply for leave to have you
admitted to bail. This is refused, the case
being too serious, and you are committed to
Newgate to take your trial. In another hour
you are in the criminal ward of the Old
Bailey Prison, with ten days to the next