y're naughty too, or else
they voud'nt be so afear'd o' the rod!--here's your health;" and he
tossed off the proffered bumper.

"Excuse me a-rising to return thanks," replied his friend, grasping
Sammy's hand, and looking at him with that fixed and glassy gaze which
indicates the happy state of inebriety, termed maudlin; "I know you're a
sincere friend, and there ain't nobody as I value more: man and boy have
I knowed you; you're unchanged! you're the same!! there ain't no
difference!!! and I hope you may live many years to go a-fishing, and I
may live to see it, Sammy. Yes, old boy, this here's one of them days
that won't be forgotten: it's engraved on my memory deep as the words on
a tombstone, 'Here he lies! Here he lies!'" he repeated with a hiccup,
and rolled at full length across his dear friend.

Sammy, nearly as much overcome as his friend, lifted up his head, and
sticking his hat upon it, knocked it over his eyes, and left him to
repose; and, placing his own back against an accommodating tree, he
dropped his pipe, and then followed the example of his companion.

After a few hours deep slumber, they awoke. The sun had gone down, and
evening had already drawn her star-bespangled mantle over the scene of
their festive sport.

Arousing themselves, they sought for their rods, and the remnants of
their provisions, but they were all gone.

"My hey! Sammy, if somebody bas'nt taken advantage of us. My watch too
has gone, I declare."

"And so's mine!" exclaimed Sammy, feeling his empty fob. "Vell, if this
ain't a go, never trust me."

"I tell you vot it is, Sammy; some clever hartist or another has seen us
sleeping, like the babes in the wood, and has drawn us at full length!"

THE BILL-STICKER.

What a mysterious being is the bill-sticker! How seldom does he make
himself visible to the eyes of the people. Nay, I verily believe there
are thousands in this great metropolis that never saw a specimen. We see
the effect, but think not of the cause.

He must work at his vocation either at night or at early dawn, before the
world is stirring.

That he is an industrious being, and sticks to business, there cannot be
the shadow of a doubt, for every dead-wall is made lively by his
operations, and every hoard a fund of information--in such type, too,
that he who runs may read. What an indefatigable observer he must be;
for there is scarcely a brick or board in city or suburb, however newly
erected