lt-in-Tun,"
Fleet Street, seven o'clock in the morning was the word. My tutor, the
Reverend Edward P----, to whom I hereby present my best compliments,
had a parting interview with me: gave me my little account for my
governor: the remaining part of the coach-hire; five shillings for my
own expenses; and some five-and-twenty shillings on an old account
which had been over-paid, and was to be restored to my family.

Away I ran and paid Hawker his three-and-six. Ouf! what a weight it
was off my mind! (He was a Norfolk boy, and used to go home from Mrs.
Nelson's "Bell Inn," Aldgate--but that is not to the point.) The next
morning, of course, we were an hour before the time. I and another boy
shared a hackney-coach, two-and-six; porter for putting luggage on
coach, threepence. I had no more money of my own left. Rasherwell, my
companion, went into the "Bolt-in-Tun" coffee-room, and had a good
breakfast. I couldn't: because, though I had five-and-twenty shillings
of my parents' money, I had none of my own, you see.

I certainly intended to go without breakfast, and still remember how
strongly I had that resolution in my mind. But there was that hour to
wait. A beautiful August morning--I am very hungry. There is
Rasherwell "tucking" away in the coffee-room. I pace the street, as
sadly almost as if I had been coming to school, not going thence. I
turn into a court by mere chance--I vow it was by mere chance--and
there I see a coffee-shop with a placard in the window. "Coffee,
Twopence, Round of buttered toast, Twopence." And here am I hungry,
penniless, with five-and-twenty shillings of my parents' money in my
pocket.

What would you have done? You see I had had my money, and spent it in
that pencil-case affair. The five-and-twenty shillings were a
trust--by me to be handed over.

But then would my parents wish their only child to be actually without
breakfast? Having this money and being so hungry, so _very_ hungry,
mightn't I take ever so little? Mightn't I at home eat as much as I
chose?

Well, I went into the coffee-shop, and spent fourpence. I remember the
taste of the coffee and toast to this day--a peculiar, muddy,
not-sweet-enough, most fragrant coffee--a rich, rancid, yet
not-buttered-enough, delicious toast. The waiter had nothing. At any
rate, fourpence, I know, was the sum I spent. And the hunger appeased,
I got on the coach a guilty being.

At the last stage,--what is its name? I have forgotten in
seven-