mantelpiece, none on the window-sill, none on the hearth-rug, none being
used as book-markers. I tugged at the bell till William John came in
quaking, and then I asked him fiercely what he had done with my pipes. I
was so obviously not to be trifled with that William John, as we called
him, because some thought his name was William, while others thought it
was John, very soon handed me my favorite pipe, which he found in the
rack on the smoking-table. This incident illustrates one of the very few
drawbacks of smoking-tables. Not being used to them, you forget about
them. William John, however, took the greatest pride in the table, and
whenever he saw a pipe lying on the rug he pounced upon it and placed
it, like a prisoner, in the rack. He was also most particular about the
three cigars, the two cigarettes, and the four wax vestas, keeping them
carefully in the proper compartments, where, unfortunately, I seldom
thought of looking for them.

[Illustration]

The fatal defect of the smoking-table, however, was that it was
generally rolling about the floor--the stalk in one corner, the slabs
here and there, the cigars on the rug to be trampled on, the lid of the
tobacco-jar beneath a chair. Every morning William John had to put the
table together. Sometimes I had knocked it over accidentally. I would
fling a crumpled piece of paper into the waste-paper basket. It missed
the basket but hit the smoking-table, which went down like a wooden
soldier. When my fire went out, just because I had taken my eyes off it
for a moment, I called it names and flung the tongs at it. There was a
crash--the smoking-table again. In time I might have remedied this; but
there is one weakness which I could not stand in any smoking-table. A
smoking-table ought to be so constructed that from where you are sitting
you can stretch out your feet, twist them round the stalk, and so lift
the table to the spot where it will be handiest. This my smoking-table
would never do. The moment I had it in the air it wanted to stand on its
head.

Though I still admired smoking-tables as much as ever, I began to want
very much to give this one away. The difficulty was not so much to know
whom to give it to as how to tie it up. My brother was the very person,
for I owed him a letter, and this, I thought, would do instead. For a
month I meant to pack the table up and send it to him; but I always put
off doing it, and at last I thought the best plan would be to give