vacancy. For my qualifications I am damnably well up in precise-writing
(Note. He means precis writing) and am much addicted to the swearing of
European oaths. I am no believing old and rotten superstition of ancient
forefathers, but am iconoclast smashing idols to detriment of damn
scoundrels. If I should be successful for the post, I and my wife and
children will fall on our bended knees, as in duty bound, and offer up
prayers for your Honour, your Honour's lady, and your posthumous
children to follow up hereafter.

Your most obedient servant.

"LOVE, WITH A WITNESS!"
[Sidenote: _Hood_]

He has shaved off his whiskers and blackened his brows,
Wears a patch and a wig of false hair--
But it's him--oh, it's him !--we exchanged lover's vows
When I lived up in Cavendish Square.

He had beautiful eyes, and his lips were the same,
And his voice was as soft as a flute--
Like a Lord or a Marquis he looked, when he came
To make love in his master's best suit.

If I lived for a thousand long years from my birth,
I shall never forget what he told--
How he loved me beyond the rich women of earth,
With their jewels and silver and gold!

When he kissed me, and bade me adieu with a sigh,
By the light of the sweetest of moons,
Oh, how little I dreamt I was bidding good-bye
To my Misses's teapot and spoons!

MR TESTATOR
[Sidenote: _Charles Dickens_]

Mr. Testator took a set of chambers in Lyons Inn when he had but very
scanty furniture for his bedroom, and none for his sitting-room. He had
lived some wintry months in this condition, and had found it very bare
and cold. One night, past midnight, when he sat writing and still had
writing to do that must be done before he went to bed, he found himself
out of coals. He had coals downstairs, but had never been to his cellar;
however, the cellar-key was on his mantelshelf, and if he went down and
opened the cellar it fitted, he might fairly assume the coals in that
cellar to be his. As to his laundress, she lived among the coal-wagons
and Thames watermen--for there were Thames watermen at that time--in
some unknown rat-hole by the river, down lanes and alleys on the other
side of the Strand. As to any other person to meet him or obstruct him,
Lyons Inn was dreaming, drunk, maudlin, moody, betting, brooding over
bill-discounting or renewing--asleep or awake, minding its own affairs.
Mr. Testator took his coal-scuttle in one han