and goes
out to dinner as much as ever he can.

He mostly dines at the Oxford and Cambridge Club, of which you can
easily see by his appearance that he is a member; he takes the joint and
his half-pint of wine, for Minchin does everything like a gentleman.
He is rather of a literary turn; still makes Latin verses with some
neatness; and before he was called, was remarkably fond of the flute.

When Mr. Minchin goes out in the evening, his clerk brings his bag to
the Club, to dress; and if it is at all muddy, he turns up his trousers,
so that he may come in without a speck. For such a party as this,
he will have new gloves; otherwise Frederick, his clerk, is chiefly
employed in cleaning them with India-rubber.

He has a number of pleasant stories about the Circuit and the
University, which he tells with a simper to his neighbor at dinner; and
has always the last joke of Mr. Baron Maule. He has a private fortune of
five thousand pounds; he is a dutiful son; he has a sister married, in
Harley Street; and Lady Jane Ranville has the best opinion of him, and
says he is a most excellent and highly principled young man.

Her ladyship and daughter arrived just as Mr. Minchin had popped his
clogs into the umbrella-stand; and the rank of that respected person,
and the dignified manner in which he led her up stairs, caused all
sneering on the part of the domestics to disappear.

THE BALL-ROOM DOOR.

A hundred of knocks follow Frederick Minchin's: in half an hour Messrs.
Spoff, Pinch, and Clapperton have begun their music, and Mulligan, with
one of the Miss Bacons, is dancing majestically in the first quadrille.
My young friends Giles and Tom prefer the landing-place to the
drawing-rooms, where they stop all night, robbing the refreshment-trays
as they come up or down. Giles has eaten fourteen ices: he will have a
dreadful stomach-ache to-morrow. Tom has eaten twelve, but he has had
four more glasses of negus than Giles. Grundsell, the occasional waiter,
from whom Master Tom buys quantities of ginger-beer, can of course deny
him nothing. That is Grundsell, in the tights, with the tray. Meanwhile
direct your attention to the three gentlemen at the door: they are
conversing.

1st Gent.--Who's the man of the house--the bald man?

2nd Gent.--Of course. The man of the house is always bald. He's a
stockbroker, I believe. Snooks brought me.

1st Gent.--Have you been to the tea-room? There's a pretty girl in the
tea-room; blue