, cabs
and divers other vehicles, the fatigued audience are at length set in
motion towards their respective dwellings.

Again poor Harry Brown is a fit subject for our commiseration. The
ill-fated young man is placed by the side of Miss Smith's mother, a
rather antique lady; Cousin George somehow or other, has managed to
place himself beside Miss Smith. The carriage passes a lamp-post, and
though Harry Brown does observe Cousin George's left hand, the
disappearance of the right is something for which he cannot at all
account, except upon the laws of proximity which pertain to cousinship.
While the carriage proceeds homewards the party does not converse as
freely as they did a short time before, under the exhilaration arising
from gas-light and gossip. Harry Brown finds the ride a bore, Mrs. Smith
is so deaf, and still has her ideas of public amusement, confined to the
times when Mr. Kemble, Mr. Cooper and Mr. Cooke, performed in the
_legitimate_ drama to crowded houses. Cousin George's position is such a
happy one, that conversation is to him a thing superfluous.

Those whose means authorise them, and very often those whose means do
not authorise them, go home to a nice supper, some delicate partridges,
cold capon, or deviled turkey, and a bottle or two of champagne. Under
the influences of the warm room and the viands, not to mention that
"warm champagny, old particular brandy-punchy feeling" induced by the
popping cork, the events of the whole evening are reviewed in a quite
thorough manner, though without much attention to a "_lucidus ordo_."

Let us follow the Smiths home, and see what is their mode of terminating
the evening. Scarcely have they settled themselves at table before a
glass of champagne is administered all round, and a very severe
criticism of Bosio is commenced by Cousin George, who says in a very
opinionated way, that he likes her pretty well, but prefers either
Truffi or Stefanoni. Miss Smith immediately espouses the cause of the
injured Bosio, whom she has often declared she could listen to
"forever," and calls on Harry Brown to come to the rescue of the
cantatrice's reputation. Harry, who has been sadly silent ever since the
miraculous disappearance of Cousin George's right hand in the carriage,
at once becomes a violent Bosioite, and maintains the vocal abilities of
that prima donna against the whole world; whereupon Miss Smith with one
of the most approving of smiles, exclaims, "Thank you, Mr