t,--just as I have often since seen grave people
experiment upon themselves with laughing-gas and magnetism and the fumes
of ether.

"It may be too much for you, Con," said I, as I went along; "there's no
knowing what effect it may have on your nerves.

"Remember that your system is not attuned to such variations. Your
vagaries may prove extravagant, and the too sudden elevation may disturb
your naturally correct judgment." Against these doubts I pleaded the
necessity of not being ungrateful to myself, not refusing a very proper
acknowledgment of my own skill and astuteness; and, lastly, I suggested
a glancing kind of hope that, like those famed heroes who dated their
great fortune to having gone to sleep beneath the shadow of some charmed
tree, or near the ripple of a magic fountain, that I, too, should arise
from this banquet with some brilliant view of life, and see the path to
success, bright and clear before me, through the hazy mists of fancy.

As I reasoned thus, I passed various ordinaries, stopping with a kind
of instinct at each, to gaze at the luscious rounds of beef so daintily
tricked out with sprigs of parsley; the appetizing cold sirloins, so
beautifully stratified with fat and lean; with hams that might tempt
a rabbi; not to speak of certain provocative little paragraphs about
"Ox-tail and Gravy ready at all hours." "Queer world it is," said I;
"and there are passing at every instant, by tens and twenties, men and
women and children, famishing and hungry, who see all these things
separated from them by a pane of window-glass; and yet they only gather
their rags more closely together, clench their thin lips tighter, and
move on. Not that alone; but here am I, with means to buy what I want,
and yet I must not venture to cross that threshold, as though my rags
should be an insult to their broadcloth." "Move on, youngster," quoth a
policeman at this moment, and thus put an end to my soliloquy.

Wearied with rambling, and almost despairing of myself, I was about
to cross Carlisle Bridge, when the blazing effulgence of a great
ruby-colored lamplight attracted my attention, over which, in bright
letters, ran the words, "Killeen's Tavern and Chop House," and beneath:
"Steak, potatoes, and a pint of stout, one shilling and fourpence."
Armed with a bold thought, I turned and approached the house.

Two or three waiters, in white aprons, were standing at the door, and
showed little inclination to make way for me