et's insinuating manner, and Mr
Slum entered the order in a small note-book as a three-and-sixpenny
one. Mr Slum then withdrew to alter the acrostic, after taking a most
affectionate leave of his patroness, and promising to return, as soon
as he possibly could, with a fair copy for the printer.

As his presence had not interfered with or interrupted the
preparations, they were now far advanced, and were completed shortly
after his departure. When the festoons were all put up as tastily as
they might be, the stupendous collection was uncovered, and there were
displayed, on a raised platform some two feet from the floor, running
round the room and parted from the rude public by a crimson rope breast
high, divers sprightly effigies of celebrated characters, singly and in
groups, clad in glittering dresses of various climes and times, and
standing more or less unsteadily upon their legs, with their eyes very
wide open, and their nostrils very much inflated, and the muscles of
their legs and arms very strongly developed, and all their countenances
expressing great surprise. All the gentlemen were very pigeon-breasted
and very blue about the beards; and all the ladies were miraculous
figures; and all the ladies and all the gentlemen were looking
intensely nowhere, and staring with extraordinary earnestness at
nothing.

When Nell had exhausted her first raptures at this glorious sight, Mrs
Jarley ordered the room to be cleared of all but herself and the child,
and, sitting herself down in an arm-chair in the centre, formally
invested Nell with a willow wand, long used by herself for pointing out
the characters, and was at great pains to instruct her in her duty.

'That,' said Mrs Jarley in her exhibition tone, as Nell touched a
figure at the beginning of the platform, 'is an unfortunate Maid of
Honour in the Time of Queen Elizabeth, who died from pricking her
finger in consequence of working upon a Sunday. Observe the blood
which is trickling from her finger; also the gold-eyed needle of the
period, with which she is at work.'

All this, Nell repeated twice or thrice: pointing to the finger and the
needle at the right times: and then passed on to the next.

'That, ladies and gentlemen,' said Mrs Jarley, 'is jasper Packlemerton
of atrocious memory, who courted and married fourteen wives, and
destroyed them all, by tickling the soles of their feet when they were
sleeping in the consciousness of innocence and virtue. On