broken a friendship between the parties concerned: such
breaches, however, are perhaps easier healed than broken or
cracked crockery.

~~222~~~ "Surely not," was reverberated round the room, accompanied with
a general laugh against the interrupter, who seizing the paper, appeared
to read without noticing what was passing.

The company was now interrupted by the entrance of several strangers,
and our two friends departed on their return homeward for the evening.

CHAPTER XVII

"Roam where you will, o'er London's wide domains,
The mind new source of various feeling gains;
Explore the giddy town, its squares, its streets,
The 'wildered eye still fresh attraction greets;
Here spires and towers in countless numbers rise,
And lift their lofty summits to the skies;
Wilt thou ascend? then cast thine eyes below,
And view the motley groupes of joy and woe:
Lo! they whom Heaven with affluence hath blest,
Scowl with cold contumely on those distrest;
And Pleasure's maze the wealthy caitiffs thread,
While care-worn Merit asks in vain for bread;
Yet short their weal or woe, a general doom
On all awaits,--oblivion in the tomb!"

~~223~~~ Our heros next morning determined on a visit to their
Hibernian friend and his aunt, whom they found had not yet forgot the
entertainment at the Mansion-house, and which still continued to be the
favorite topic of conversation. Sir Felix expressed his satisfaction
that the worthy Citizens of London retained with increasing splendor
their long established renown of pre-eminent distinction in the art of
good living.

"And let us hope," said Dashall, "that they will not at any future
period be reduced to the lamentable necessity of restraining the
progress of epicurism, as in the year 1543, when the Lord Mayor and
Common Council enacted a sumptuary law to prevent luxurious eating; by
which it was ordered, that the Mayor should confine himself to seven,
Aldermen and Sheriffs to six, and the Sword-bearer to four dishes
at dinner or supper, under the penalty of forty shillings for each
supernumerary dish!"

"A law," rejoined the Baronet, "which voluptuaries of the present
times would find more difficult of observance than any enjoined by the
decalogue."

The Squire suggested the expediency of a similar enactment, with a
view to productive r