know that Bevis
Marks was revolutionised by these popular movements, and that peace and
quietness fled from its precincts.

Nobody was rendered more indignant by these proceedings than Mr Sampson
Brass, who, as he could by no means afford to lose so profitable an
inmate, deemed it prudent to pocket his lodger's affront along with his
cash, and to annoy the audiences who clustered round his door by such
imperfect means of retaliation as were open to him, and which were
confined to the trickling down of foul water on their heads from unseen
watering pots, pelting them with fragments of tile and mortar from the
roof of the house, and bribing the drivers of hackney cabriolets to
come suddenly round the corner and dash in among them precipitately.
It may, at first sight, be matter of surprise to the thoughtless few
that Mr Brass, being a professional gentleman, should not have legally
indicted some party or parties, active in the promotion of the
nuisance, but they will be good enough to remember, that as Doctors
seldom take their own prescriptions, and Divines do not always practise
what they preach, so lawyers are shy of meddling with the Law on their
own account: knowing it to be an edged tool of uncertain application,
very expensive in the working, and rather remarkable for its properties
of close shaving, than for its always shaving the right person.

'Come,' said Mr Brass one afternoon, 'this is two days without a Punch.
I'm in hopes he has run through 'em all, at last.'

'Why are you in hopes?' returned Miss Sally. 'What harm do they do?'

'Here's a pretty sort of a fellow!' cried Brass, laying down his pen in
despair. 'Now here's an aggravating animal!'

'Well, what harm do they do?' retorted Sally.

'What harm!' cried Brass. 'Is it no harm to have a constant hallooing
and hooting under one's very nose, distracting one from business, and
making one grind one's teeth with vexation? Is it no harm to be
blinded and choked up, and have the king's highway stopped with a set
of screamers and roarers whose throats must be made of--of--'

'Brass,' suggested Mr Swiveller.

'Ah! of brass,' said the lawyer, glancing at his clerk, to assure
himself that he had suggested the word in good faith and without any
sinister intention. 'Is that no harm?'

The lawyer stopped short in his invective, and listening for a moment,
and recognising the well-known voice, rested his head upon his hand,
raised his eyes to the ceili