e arrival
of new-comers, when there is a sort of general post all round, she is
placed at the farthest extreme to her late partner, and oh! the
wistful little glances she passes up the table to the gourmand who,
oblivious to all but his dinner, scarcely notices her departure.

There are the three old maids, intent on capturing a husband. They
have come here as a last resource. But with the usual fickleness of
fortune, they seem to be more shunned by the male sex than attracted
to it.

There is the newly-married couple, looking very conscious and silly,
as if they were the only people in the world who had ever committed
matrimony.

There is one old lady grumbling, and objecting to the back of a
chicken. Poor birds, they have only two wings each, and really cannot
provide everybody with them! There is another furious, because on
asking for a favorite dish, that is down in the _menu_, is told that
"it is all served!" The best things always are, unless you manage to
get into the good graces of the waiter or waitress.

Young men and maidens, old men and children, all here, offering plenty
of material for students of human nature!

Hotel life is very different. Even if you find the _parvenu_ and
_nouveau riche_ as equally objectionable as the boarding-house
species, at least they do not force their acquaintance upon
you. The _table d'hote_ is much more entertaining, and you are
altogether more independent. Characters you come across occasionally
that are most interesting to study. There are the girls who are taking
the round of hotels by their mothers, in the hopes of getting them
"off." There are the men who astonish everybody by their generosity
and apparent display of riches, and finally decamp without paying
their bill.

A man was telling me the other day of a certain "black sheep" who had
run into difficulty; how his family after a great deal of trouble
managed to raise L200 between them, and sent him off to America with
the money to start afresh in a new country. In a month's time he was
back again, penniless as ever, and cursing his luck and bad fortune.
It was only by accident they discovered the bills of the best hotels
in New York in his pocket, and found that he had been living like a
prince while his L200 lasted, nor had tried at all to obtain any
occupation.

With such consummate cheek, a man ought to get on in the world, I
think, for after all it is self-confidence and "bluffing" that seems
to succeed