drink, and bad tobacco. Then come rumours of
bills, then the crash, and the brilliant youth goes down, while Brown
and Tomkins and all the rowdies say, "What a fool he was to try going
our pace!" Bad company!

I should therefore say to any youth--"Always be doing something--bad
company never do anything; and thus, if you are resolved to be always
doing something useful, it follows that you will not be among the bad
company." This seems to me to be conclusive; and many a broken heart and
broken life might have been kept sound if inexperienced youths were only
taught thus much continually.

_October, 1888._

_GOOD COMPANY_.

Let it be understood that I do not intend to speak very much about the
excellent people who are kind enough to label themselves as "Society,"
for I have had quite enough experience of them at one time and another,
and my impressions are not of a peculiarly reverential kind. "Company"
among the set who regard themselves as the cream of England's--and
consequently of the world's--population is something so laborious, so
useless, so exhausting that I cannot imagine any really rational person
attending a "function" (that is the proper name) if Providence had left
open the remotest chance of running away; at any rate, the rational
person would not endure more than one experience. For, when the
clear-seeing outsider looks into "Society," and studies the members who
make up the little clique, he is smitten with thoughts that lie too deep
for tears--or laughter. A perfectly fresh mind, when brought to bear on
the "Society" phenomenon, asks, "What are these people? What have they
done? What are they particularly fitted for? Is there anything noble
about them? Is their conversation at all charming? Are any of them
really happy?" And to all of these queries the most disappointing
answers must be returned. Take the men. Here is a marquis who is a
Knight of the Garter. He has held offices in several Cabinets; he can
control the votes spread over a very large slice of a county, and his
income amounts to some trifle like one hundred and eighty thousand
pounds per year. We may surely expect something of the superb
aristocratic grace here, and surely a chance word of wit may drop from a
man who has been in the most influential of European assemblies! Alas!
The potentate crosses his hand over his comfortable stomach, and his
contributions to the entertainment of the evening amount to occasional
ejaculatio