-night, if they
wish?"

"Oh, yes," says the landlord, "certainly--I can send the gentlemen in if
they wish."

"Very well, sir,--they may get very _tight_ before they desire to
return--they are men of families, respectable citizens, and I do not
wish them, under any circumstances, to leave your house until morning.
Whatever the bill is I will foot, provided you deny them any of your
means to go in to-night. You understand!"

"Oh! yes, sir--if you request it as a matter of favor, that I shall
keep your friends here, I will endeavor to do so--but hadn't you better
attend to them yourself?"

"Well, you see," says Brown, "I have business of importance to
transact--must be in town this evening. Give the party all they
wish--put that in your fob--(handing the host an X)--post up your bill
in the morning, and I'll be out bright and early to make all square. Do
you hark?" says Brown.

"Oh, yes, sir--all right," responded the landlord.

Brown gave his confederate the _cue_, stepped out, promising to "be in
in a minute," and then, getting into a carriage, he drove back to the
city, almost tickled to death with the idea of how nicely the whigs
would be "dished" when they all met at the City Hall, and came up minus
_two!_

Smith, Brown's loco friend, did his best to keep the thing up, by
calling in the New Jersey thunder and lightning--vulgarly known as
Champagne--and even walked into the aforesaid t. and l. so deeply
himself, that a man with half an eye might see Smith would be as blind
as an owl in the course of the evening. But Smith was bound to do the
thing up brown, and thought no sacrifice too great or too expensive to
preserve the loaves and fishes of his party. All of a sudden, however,
night was drawing on a pace, the whigs began to smell a _mice_. The
absence of Brown, and the excessive politeness and liberality of Smith,
in hurrying up the bottles, settled it in the minds of the whigs, that
something was going on dangerous to the whig cause, and that they had
better look out--_and so they did_.

"Jones," says one of the whigs, _sotto voce_, to the other, "Brown has
cleared; it is evident he and Smith calculate to corner us here, prevent
your presence in 'the Tea Room' to-night, and thus defeat your vote."

"The deuce! You don't think that, Hall, do you?"

"Faith, I do; but we won't be caught napping. Waiter, bring in a bottle
of brandy."

"Brandy?" said Smith, in astonishment. "Why, you ain't going to dive