s of living with red
herrings and gooses' eggs." And so saying Mr Daggles resumed his usual
seat in the dining-room, and went on with the perusal of the _Morning
Post_.

CHAPTER II.

Mr Pitskiver's origin, like that of early Greece, is lost in the
depths of antiquity. Through an infinite variety of posts and offices,
he had risen to his present position, and was perhaps the most
multifariously occupied gentleman in her majesty's dominions. He was
chairman of three companies, steward of six societies, general agent,
and had lately reached the crowning eminence of his hopes by being
appointed trustee of unaudited accounts. In the midst of all these
labours, he had gone on increasing in breadth and honour till his name
was a symbol of every thing respectable and well to do in the world.
With each new office his ambition rose, and a list of his residences
would be a perfect index to the state of his fortunes. We can trace
him from Stepney to Whitechapel; from Whitechapel to Finsbury square;
from Finsbury square to Hammersmith; and finally, the last office
(which, by the by, was without a salary) had raised him, three months
before our account of him begins, to the centre of Harley Street. With
his fortune and ambition, we must do him the justice to say, his
liberality equally increased. He was a patron, and, would have
travelled fifty miles to entertain a poet at his table; he had
music-masters (without any other pupils) who were Mozarts and Handels
for his daughters--Turners and Landseers (whose names were yet
unknown) to teach them drawing--for, by a remarkable property
possessed by him, in common with a great majority of mankind, every
thing gained a new value when it came into contact with himself. He
bought sets of china because they were _artistic_; changed his silver
plate for a more _picturesque_ pattern; employed Stultz for his
clothes, and, above all, Bell and Rannie for his wines. His cook was
superb; and, thanks to the above-named Bell and Rannie, there were
fewer headachs in the morning after a Maecenatian dinner at
Pitskiver's, than could have been expected by Father Matthew himself.
With these two exceptions--wine and clothes--his patronage was more
indiscriminate than judicious. In fact, he patronized for the sake of
patronizing; and as he was always in search of a new miracle, it is no
wonder that he was sometimes disappointed--that his Landseers
sometimes turned out to have no eyes, and his musici