The things we do!

He lived
in ease and comfort there. "You don't suppose," says he, "that the
wretched stipend I draw from the Pall Mall Gazette enables me to maintain
this kind of thing? F. B., sir, has a station in the world; F. B. moves
among moneyers and City nobs, and eats cabobs with wealthy nabobs. He may
marry, sir, and settle in life." We cordially wished every worldly
prosperity to the brave F. B.
Happening to descry him one day in the Park, I remarked that his
countenance wore an ominous and tragic appearance, which seemed to deepen
as he neared me. I thought he had been toying affably with a nursery-maid
the moment before, who stood with some of her little charges watching the
yachts upon the Serpentine. Howbeit, espying my approach, F. B. strode
away from the maiden and her innocent companions, and advanced to greet
his old acquaintance, enveloping his face with shades of funereal gloom.
"Yon were the children of my good friend Colonel Huckaback of the Bombay
Marines! Alas! unconscious of their doom, the little infants play.


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