by an effort,
he broke forth in speech.

"Snipe," he said--and seeing that Mr Snipe's ears were open, he
continued--"I can't tell how it is, but I saw, when first I came, you
had never been in a reg'lar fambly--never."

"We was always more reg'larer at Miss Hendy's nor here--bed every
night at ten o'clock, and up in the morning at five."

"You'll never get up to cribbage--you're so confounded slow," replied
the senior; "you'll have to stick to dominoes, which is only fit for
babbies. Did ye think I meant Miss Hendy's, or low people of that
kind, when I spoke of a reg'lar fambly?--I meant that you had never
seen life. Did you ever change plates for a marquis, Snipe?"

"Never heared of one. Is he in a great way of business?"

"A marquis is a reg'lar nob, you know; and gives reg'lar good wages
when you gets 'em paid. A man can't be a gentleman as lives with
vulgar people--old Pitskiver is a genuine snob."

"He's a rich gentleman," returned Mr Snipe.

"But he's low--uncommon low"--said the other--"reg'lar boiled mutton
and turnips."

"And a wery good dish too," observed Mr Snipe, whose intellect, being
strictly limited to dominoes, was not quite equal to the metaphorical.

"By mutton and turnips, I means--he may be rich; but he ain't genteel,
Snipe. Look at our Sophiar's shoulders."

Mr Snipe looked up towards his senior with a puzzled expression, as if
he waited for information--"What has Miss Sophiar's shoulders to do
with boiled mutton and turnips?"

"Nothing won't do but to be at it from the very beginning," said the
superior, with a toss of his powdered head; "fight after it as much as
ever they like, wear the best of gownds, and go to the fustest of
boarding-schools--though they plays ever so well on the piando, and
talks Italian like a reg'lar Frenchman--nothing won't do--_there's_
the boiled mutton and turnips--shocking wulgarity! Look again, I say,
at our Sophiar's shoulders, and see how her head's set on. Spinks's
Charlotte is a very different affair--and there she is at the winder
over the way. That's quite the roast fowl and blamange," he continued,
looking at a very beautiful girl who appeared at the window of one of
the opposite houses--"a pretty blowen as ever I see, and uncommon fond
of Spinks."

"I see nothing like a fowl about the young lady," replied the prosaic
Mr Snipe; "and Spinks is a horrid liar."

"But can't you judge for yourself, Snipe? That girl opposite found two
footmen and a