y boy! don't you know me?"

The reader may praps recklect a very affecting letter which was
published in the last chapter of these memoars; in which the writer
requested a loan of five hundred pound from Mr. Algernon Deuceace, and
which boar the respected signatur of the Earl of Crabs, Mr. Deuceace's
own father. It was that distinguished arastycrat who was now smokin and
laffin in our room.

My Lord Crabs was, as I preshumed, about 60 years old. A stowt, burly,
red-faced, bald-headed nobleman, whose nose seemed blushing at what his
mouth was continually swallowing; whose hand, praps, trembled a little;
and whose thy and legg was not quite so full or as steddy as they
had been in former days. But he was a respecktabble, fine-looking old
nobleman; and though it must be confest, 1/2 drunk when we fust made our
appearance in the salong, yet by no means moor so than a reel noblemin
ought to be.

"What, Algy my boy!" shouts out his lordship, advancing and seasing
master by the hand, "doan't you know your own father?"

Master seemed anythink but overhappy. "My lord," says he, looking very
pail, and speakin rayther slow, "I didn't--I confess--the unexpected
pleasure--of seeing you in Paris. The fact is, sir, said he," recovering
himself a little; "the fact is, there was such a confounded smoke of
tobacco in the room, that I really could not see who the stranger was
who had paid me such an unexpected visit."

"A bad habit, Algernon; a bad habit," said my lord, lighting another
seagar: "a disgusting and filthy practice, which you, my dear child,
will do well to avoid. It is at best, dear Algernon, but a nasty, idle
pastime, unfitting a man as well for mental exertion as for respectable
society; sacrificing, at once, the vigor of the intellect and the graces
of the person. By-the-by, what infernal bad tobacco they have, too, in
this hotel. Could not you send your servant to get me a few seagars at
the Cafe de Paris? Give him a five-franc piece, and let him go at once,
that's a good fellow."

Here his lordship hiccupt, and drank off a fresh tumbler of shampang.
Very sulkily, master drew out the coin, and sent me on the errint.

Knowing the Cafe de Paris to be shut at that hour, I didn't say a word,
but quietly establisht myself in the ante-room; where, as it happened
by a singler coinstdints, I could hear every word of the conversation
between this exlent pair of relatifs.

"Help yourself, and get another bottle," says my