parently recognising the picture of their own chicanery
with amusement and relish.

After that they held on their way for some minutes in silence. They
had now reached the other side, and were confronted by a couple
of respectable-looking gentlemen of an almost clerical aspect, who
appeared to be catering in the public streets in the interests of some
institution. They approached _Mr. Punch_ and Father TIME, and offered
them a prospectus.

"'THE DEAR LITTLE CHILDREN'S HAPPY AND ELEGANT BURIAL INSTITUTION,'"
read _Mr. Punch_, surveying the paper presented to him, and
continuing, "'_A trivial payment of Ninepence a Month will ensure
the youthful Subscriber, or his Representative, a sweet and
elegantly-constructed little Coffin, beautifully frilled, with a
one-black-horse Family Omnibus Hearse, and a tray of Two Handsome
Plumes. N.B.--if preferred, payment of L2 19s. 6d. in cash on
production of Corpse._'"

They showed _Mr. Punch_ and Father TIME up the front steps, and
ushered them into a large hall. It was thronged with a crowd of dirty
and raggedly-dressed people, and partitioned off by a handsome and
massive mahogany counter, beyond which sat a staff of clerks busily
engaged in keeping the books and generally discharging the duties of
the institution.

[Illustration]

"Ha, Mrs. MACSTOGGINS, and are we in your debt again?" asked the Agent
of a beetle-browed woman of a sinister and forbidding expression, who
was thrusting a paper across the counter to the cashier.

"Yes; and I'll trouble you not to keep me waiting, either--seeing that
it's gone three days since the burial."

"Is this woman demanding the insurance money for the burial of her own
child?" asked _Mr. Punch_, sternly. And he turned his ring. "And pray,
Madam," he continued, addressing the beetle-browed woman, "tell me the
truth."

"Certainly," replied the woman, as if in a trance. "First, I insured
my own KATE--then I starved her to death, and took the money. Then
little BILL followed. I let him catch cold in the winter, and gave
him a night or two on the stones, and that finished him. Then came TIM
FLAHERTY, and I managed him with the beetle-poison, and--"

"Come," said _Mr. Punch_, taking Father TIME's arm once more; "let us
get out of this--I can't breathe here."

Scarcely had they quitted the place ere they had to encounter an
appeal for custom, the Applicant being apparently one of the big guns
in the Mercury wine trade, and he was not long