uld have liked to hob and nob with celebrated pickpockets, or
drink a pot of ale with a company of burglars and cracksmen, had chance
afforded him an opportunity of making the acquaintance of this class of
society. It was good to see the gravity with which Warrington listened
to the Tutbury Pet or the Brighton Stunner at the Champion's Arms, and
behold the interest which he took in the coalheaving company assembled
at the Fox-under-the-Hill. His acquaintance with the public-houses of
the metropolis and its neighbourhood, and with the frequenters of their
various parlours, was prodigious. He was the personal friend of the
landlord and landlady, and welcome to the bar as to the clubroom. He
liked their society, he said, better than that of his own class, whose
manners annoyed him, and whose conversation bored him. "In society,"
he used to say, "everybody is the same, wears the same dress, eats and
drinks, and says the same things; one young dandy at the club talks and
looks just like another, one Miss at a ball exactly resembles another,
whereas there's character here. I like to talk with the strongest man in
England, or the man who can drink the most beer in England, or with
that tremendous republican of a hatter, who thinks Thistlewood was the
greatest character in history. I like better gin-and-water than claret.
I like a sanded floor in Carnaby Market better than a chalked one in
Mayfair. I prefer Snobs, I own it." Indeed, this gentleman was a social
republican; and it never entered his head while conversing with Jack
and Tom that he was in any respect their better; although, perhaps, the
deference which they paid him might secretly please him.

Pen followed him then to these various resorts of men with great glee
and assiduity. But he was considerably younger, and therefore much more
pompous and stately than Warrington, in fact a young prince in disguise,
visiting the poor of his father's kingdom. They respected him as a high
chap, a fine fellow, a regular young swell. He had somehow about him
an air of imperious good-humour, and a royal frankness and majesty,
although he was only heir-apparent to twopence-halfpenny, and but one
in descent from a gallypot. If these positions are made for us, we
acquiesce in them very easily; and are always pretty ready to assume a
superiority over those who are as good as ourselves. Pen's condescension
at this time of his life was a fine thing to witness. Amongst men of
ability this a