"

"Punch-and-Judy hunting?" said Frank, contemptuously. "No; I am going
to make an excursion to Cambridge."

"Remember," said Master Lewis, who had heard Tommy's remark, "that
London is a wilderness of streets. You must not wander far from any
principal street. Never lose sight of the cabs and omnibuses."

"I feel perfectly sure that I shall need no other help than the
cabman's in finding my way back. I have taken ten shillings in my
purse in case of an emergency."

"Keep your purse in your pocket wherever you find yourself," said
Master Lewis. "Punch-and-Judy crowds have not the credit of being the
most honest people."

Tommy found the hunting for street performances indeed alluring. Every
court and alley seemed alive with the most remarkable entertainments a
boy could witness.

[Illustration: STREET AMUSEMENTS.]

He first met three grotesque musicians who had gathered around them an
audience of admiring house-maids, dilatory market-people, and unkempt
children. But the hat for contributions was passed so soon after he
joined himself to the music-loving company that he at once left for
another performance where the call for money might not be so pressing.
A fiddler with three performing dogs, that were bedecked with hats and
ruffles, quite exceeded in dramatic interest the former exhibition.
But the fiddler, too, had immediate need of money, and Tommy
remembered Master Lewis's caution about the purse, and passed on to a
public place that seemed quite alive with groups of people gathered
around curious sights and entertainments.

The pastimes here took a scientific turn. Chief among these street
showmen rose the tall head of a middle-aged gentleman--"the
professor"--who administered the "galvanic grip."

"Has fast has yer cured, gentlemen, pass right along, pass right
along, and give others a chance. 'Ave you han hache or a pain? I say,
'ave you han hache or a pain? Cure ye right hup, right hup hin a
minute. I'll tell you what, it is astonishing, gentlemen, what cures
science will perform."

[Illustration: STREET AMUSEMENTS.]

At this point some one not schooled in the mysteries of science
received a very liberal dose of the "magnetic grip," and doubled his
body with an "O!" that seemed to be shot out of him, when the crowd
laughed and moved on.

You pay your five or ten pence and are presented with the handles
forming the terminations of the electric wire: you grasp these as
tight as you can, one in e