d a waterproof
composition--there was fourteen weeks of drought; he sold his patent for
two-and-sixpence, and had the satisfaction of walking home for the next
three months wet through, from his gossamer to his _ci-devant_ Wellingtons,
now literally, from their hydraulic powers, "_pumps_."

He lost everything but his heart! And uncle Bucket was all heart! a red
cabbage couldn't exceed it in size, and, like that, it seemed naturally
predestined to be everlastingly in a pickle! Still it was a heart! You were
welcomed to his venison when he had it--his present saveloy was equally at
your service. He must have been remarkably attached to facetious elderly
poultry of the masculine gender, as his invariable salute to the tenants of
his "heart's core" was, "How are you, my jolly old cock?" Coats became
threadbare, and defunct trousers vanished; waistcoats were never replaced;
gossamers floated down the tide of Time; boots, deprived of all hope of
future renovation by the loss of their _soles_, mouldered in obscurity; but
the clear voice and chuckling salute were changeless as the statutes of the
Medes and Persians, the price and size of penny tarts, or the accumulating
six-and-eightpences gracing a lawyer's bill.

Poor uncle Job Bucket's fortune had driven "him down the rough tide of
power," when first and last we met; all was blighted save the royal heart;
and yet, with shame we own the truth, we blushed to meet him. Why? ay, why?
We own the weakness!--the heart, the goodly heart, was almost cased in
rags!

"Puppy!"

Right, reader, right; we were a puppy. Lash on, we richly deserve it! but,
consider the fearful influence of worn-out cloth! Can a long series of
unchanging kindness balance patched elbows? are not cracked boots receipts
in full for hours of anxious love and care? does not the kindness of a life
fade "like the baseless fabric of a vision" before the withering touch of
poverty's stern stamp? Have you ever felt--

"Eh? what? No--stuff! Yes, yes--go on, go on."

We will!--we blushed for our uncle's coat! His heart, God bless it, never
caused a blush on the cheek of man, woman, child, or even angel, to rise
for that. We will confess. Let's see, we are sixty now (we don't look so
much, but we are sixty). Well, be it so. We were handsome once--is this
vanity at sixty? if so, our grey hairs are a hatchment for the past. We
were "swells once!--hurrah!--we were!" Stop, this is indecent--let us be
calm--our action wa