watch then?--

"Yes--value sixpence, one of those they sell at fairs. I had bought it
about half a year before--put a nice green riband to it, and a twopenny
key.--This it was that got me the silver seal, and I'll tell you how.
The Sunday after I bought it, I stood in the aisle of the church, looked
at the great clock, and pompously pulling out my pewter watch, and
looking at it as proudly as it were a real one, affected to wind it up
and set it, studiously comparing it with the church clock and putting it
up to my ear. A Mr. ----,[5] a worthy man of some opulence, who lived
near us and was in the habit of coming to our house to take his pint,
came up to me and, with a serious air, pulling out his old gold watch,
with a gold dial plate, gravely said to me, while he inwardly
laughed--"Pray sir what is the time of the day by your watch,--let us
see, do our watches agree, sir:" I blushed.--"Nay, said he, I do but
jest with you my child--you must not be angry with me. Come, come; if
you have not a gold watch, you shall have a silver seal to tie to your
riband," saying which he brought me home and, taking one from the drawer
of a black inkstand, gave it to me. What had a boy to fear that had
three shillings in his pocket, a silver seal hanging to his watch
_string_, and a pair of large silver buckles in his shoes? nothing--at
least so I thought at that time."

(_To be continued._)

[Footnote 3: I believe it was the man his mother married; but he
never told me so, being retentive on that subject. --_Biog._]

[Footnote 4: There are many people in America who remember
Hodgkinson's excellence in singing the famous laughing song
"_Now's the time for mirth and glee_."]

[Footnote 5: The writer laments that he has forgot this person's
name.]

PORTRAIT OF THE CELEBRATED BETTERTON.

(_Continued from page 140._)

Notwithstanding the extraordinary power he showed in blowing Alexander
once more into a blaze of admiration, Betterton had so just a sense of
what was true or false applause, that I have heard him say, he never
thought any kind of it equal to an attentive silence; that there were
many ways of deceiving an audience into a loud one; but to keep them
hushed and quiet was an applause which only truth and merit could arrive
at; of which art there never was an equal master to himself. From these
various excellencies, he had so full a possession of the esteem and
regard of his auditors, that,