"here is wherewithal to pay your footing at Mrs. Davis's. As a
traveller from the old country, you 'll be expected to entertain the
servants' hall,--do it liberally; there's nothing like a bold push at
the first go off."

"I know it, sir; my father used to say that the gentleman always won his
election who made most freeholders drunk the first day of the poll."

"Your father was a man of keen observation, Con."

"And is, sir, still, with your leave, if kangaroo meat has n't disagreed
with him, and left me to sustain the honors of the house."

"Oh, that's it, Con, is it?" said Captain Pike, with a sly glance.

"Yes, sir, that's it," said I, replying more to his look than his words.

"Here's the letter for Mrs. Davis: you'll present it early to-morrow; be
discreet, keep your own counsel, and I 've no doubt you 'll do well."

"I'd be an ungrateful vagabond if I made your honor out a false
prophet," said I; and, bowing respectfully to the company, I withdrew.

"What a wonderful principle of equilibrium exists between one's heart
and one's pocket!" thought I as I went downstairs. "I never felt the
former so light as now that the latter is heavy."

I wandered out into the town, somewhat puzzled how to dispose of
myself for the evening. Had I been performing the part of a "walking
gentleman," I fancied I could have easily hit upon some appropriate and
becoming pastime. A theatre,--there was one in the "Lower Town,"--and a
tavern afterwards, would have filled the interval before it was time to
go to bed. "Time to go to bed! "--strange phrase, born of a thousand and
one conventionalities. For some, that time comes when the sun has
set, and with its last beams of rosy light reminds labor of the coming
morrow. To some, it is the hour when wearied faculties can do no more,
when tired intellect falters "by the way," and cannot keep the "line of
march." To others, it comes with dawning light, and when roses and rouge
look ghastly; and to others, again, whose "deeds are evil," it is the
glare of noonday.

Now, as for me, I was neither wearied by toil nor pleasure; no sense of
past fatigue, no anticipation of coming exertion, invited slumber,--nay,
I was actually more wakeful than I had been during the entire evening,
and I felt a most impulsive desire for a little social enjoyment,--that
kind of intercourse with strangers which I always remarked had the
effect of eliciting my own conversational qualities to a degree that
ast