of incarceration and
hard labour. He is now an active member of a company legally
incorporated under government sanction, for grinding the wind upon the
revolving principle. It is not precisely known when the first dividend
on the Long Range Excavators will be declared. Sanguine speculators in
the L. R. E., and the Thames Conflagration Company, expect to draw
both dividends on the same day. In the meantime, the books are safe in
the custody of Messrs Holdem Tight and Brass, of Thieves' Inn; and
ill-natured people are not wanting, who insinuate that they constitute
the only property available for the benefit of the shareholders.

Let us now take a glance at a snug little commercial bubble, blown
into being by 'highly respectable men,' a private affair altogether,
which never had a name upon 'Change, and was managed--we cannot say to
the satisfaction of all parties--by the originating contrivers,
without making any noise in the papers, or exciting public attention
in any way. We will call it, for the sake of a name, 'The Babel and
Lowriver Steam Navigation Company.' Lowriver is a pleasant, genteel
little village, which has of late years sprung suddenly into existence
on the coast of ----shire, and has been growing, for the last seven
years, with each succeeding summer, more and more a place of favourite
resort with the inhabitants of Babel. Mr Montague Whalebone took an
early liking to the place, and built a row of goodly houses by the
water-side, and a grand hotel at the end of the few stumps of pitchy
stakes dignified by the name of the pier. But the hotel lacked
customers, and the houses wanted tenants; and the whole affair
threatened to fall a prey to river-fog and mildew, when the Babel and
Lowriver Steam Navigation Company came to the rescue, and placed it
upon a permanent and expansive footing. Of the original constitution
of this snug company, it is not easy to say anything with certainty.
All we know is, that, some seven years ago, it was currently spoken of
in private circles as a capital investment for money, supposing only
that shares could be got: _that_ was the difficult thing. Large
dividends were to be realised by building four steamers, and running
them between Babel and Lowriver. Upon the neat hot-pressed prospectus,
privately and sparingly circulated--it was whispered that it was too
good a thing to go a begging--appeared the names of Erebus Carbon,
Esq., of Diamond Wharf; of Montague Whalebone, Esq.,