thing. Next the further left-hand corner, near the
lower end of the table, sits the deformed person. The chair at his side,
occupying that corner, is empty. I need not specially mention the other
boarders, with the exception of Benjamin Franklin, the landlady's son,
who sits near his mother. We are a tolerably assorted set,--difference
enough and likeness enough; but still it seems to me there is something
wanting. The Landlady's Daughter is the prima donna in the way of
feminine attractions. I am not quite satisfied with this young lady.
She wears more "jewelry," as certain young ladies call their trinkets,
than I care to see on a person in her position. Her voice is strident,
her laugh too much like a giggle, and she has that foolish way of dancing
and bobbing like a quill-float with a "minnum" biting the hook below it,
which one sees and weeps over sometimes in persons of more pretensions.
I can't help hoping we shall put something into that empty chair yet
which will add the missing string to our social harp. I hear talk of a
rare Miss who is expected. Something in the schoolgirl way, I believe.
We shall see.

--My friend who calls himself The Autocrat has given me a caution which I
am going to repeat, with my comment upon it, for the benefit of all
concerned.

Professor,--said he, one day,--don't you think your brain will run dry
before a year's out, if you don't get the pump to help the cow? Let me
tell you what happened to me once. I put a little money into a bank, and
bought a check-book, so that I might draw it as I wanted, in sums to
suit. Things went on nicely for a time; scratching with a pen was as
easy as rubbing Aladdin's Lamp; and my blank check-book seemed to be a
dictionary of possibilities, in which I could find all the synonymes of
happiness, and realize any one of them on the spot. A check came back to
me at last with these two words on it,--NO FUNDS. My check-book was a
volume of waste-paper.

Now, Professor,--said he,--I have drawn something out of your bank, you
know; and just so sure as you keep drawing out your soul's currency
without making new deposits, the next thing will be, NO FUNDS,--and then
where will you be, my boy? These little bits of paper mean your gold and
your silver and your copper, Professor; and you will certainly break up
and go to pieces, if you don't hold on to your metallic basis.

There is something in that,--said I.--Only I rather think life can coin
thou