hy of my genius: other servants may lose the watch or the
coat of their master; I went at nobler game, and lost him--his private
character!"

"How do you mean?"

"Why, I was enamoured of a lady who would not have looked at me as Mr.
Tomlinson; so I took my master's clothes and occasionally his carriage,
and made love to my nymph as Lord. Her vanity made her indiscreet. The
Tory papers got hold of it; and my master, in a change of ministers,
was declared by George the Third to be 'too gay for a Chancellor of the
Exchequer.' An old gentleman who had had fifteen children by a wife like
a Gorgon, was chosen instead of my master; and although the new minister
was a fool in his public capacity, the moral public were perfectly
content with him, because of his private virtues!

"My master was furious, made the strictest inquiry, found me out, and
turned me out too!

"A Whig not in place has an excuse for disliking the Constitution. My
distress almost made me a republican; but, true to my creed, I
must confess that I would only have levelled upwards. I especially
disaffected the inequality of riches; I looked moodily on every carriage
that passed; I even frowned like a second Catiline at the steam of a
gentle man's kitchen! My last situation had not been lucrative; I had
neglected my perquisites, in my ardour for politics. My master, too,
refused to give me a character: who would take me without one?

"I was asking myself this melancholy question one morning, when I
suddenly encountered one of the fine friends I had picked up at my old
haunt, the ordinary, in St. James's. His name was Pepper."

"Pepper!" cried Paul.

Without heeding the exclamation, Tomlinson continued:--"We went to a
tavern and drank a bottle together. Wine made me communicative; it also
opened my comrade's heart. He asked me to take a ride with him that
night towards Hounslow. I did so, and found a purse."

"How fortunate! Where?"

"In a gentleman's pocket. I was so pleased with my luck that I went
the same road twice a week, in order to see if I could pick up any more
purses. Fate favoured me, and I lived for a long time the life of the
blessed. Oh, Paul, you know not--you know not what a glorious life is
that of a highwayman; but you shall taste it one of these days,--you
shall, on my honour.

"I now lived with a club of honest fellows. We called ourselves 'The
Exclusives,'--for we were mighty reserved in our associates, and only
those who did b