quantity that Jack had.

'Sque--ee--eze it,' replied Jack, suiting the action to the word, and
working away at an exhausted lemon.

At length they finished.

'Well, I s'pose we may as well go and have some tea,' observed Jack.

'It's not announced yet,' said Sponge, 'but I make no doubt it will be
ready.'

So saying, the worthies rose, and, after sundry bumps and certain
irregularities of course, they each succeeded in reaching the door. The
passage lamp had died out and filled the corridor with its fragrance.
Sponge, however, knew the way, and the darkness favored the adjustment of
cravats and the fingering of hair. Having got up a sort of drunken simper,
Sponge opened the drawing-room door, expecting to find smiling ladies in a
blaze of light. All, however, was darkness, save the expiring embers in the
grate. The tick, tick, tick, ticking of the clocks sounded wonderfully
clear.

'Gone to bed!' exclaimed Sponge.

'WHO-HOOP!' shrieked Jack, at the top of his voice.

'What's smatter, gentlemen?--What's smatter?' exclaimed Spigot rushing in,
rubbing his eyes with one hand, and holding a block tin candlestick in the
other.

'Nothin',' replied Jack, squinting his eyes inside out; adding, 'get me a
devilled--' (hiccup).

'Don't know how to do them here, sir,' snapped Spigot.

'Devilled turkey's leg though you do, you rascal!' rejoined Jack, doubling
his fists and putting himself in posture.

'Beg pardon, sir,' replied Spigot, 'but the cook, sir, is gone to bed, sir.
Do you know, sir, what o'clock it is, sir?'

'No,' replied Jack.

'What time is it?' asked Sponge.

'Twenty minutes to two,' replied Spigot, holding up a sort of pocket
warming-pan, which he called a watch.

'The deuce!' exclaimed Sponge.

'Who'd ha' thought it?' muttered Jack.

'Well, then, I suppose we may as well go to bed,' observed Sponge.

'S'pose so,' replied Jack; 'nothin' more to get.'

'Do you know your room?' asked Sponge.

'To be sure I do,' replied Jack; 'don't think I'm d--d--dr--drunk, do you?'

'Not likely,' rejoined Sponge.

Jack then commenced a very crab-like ascent of the stairs, which
fortunately were easy, or he would never have got up. Mr. Sponge, who still
occupied the state apartments, took leave of Jack at his own door, and Jack
went bumping and blundering on in search of the branch passage leading to
his piggery. He found the green baize door that usually distinguishes the
entrance to these secondary suit