er a
pint of wine. You look cursed seedy, to be sure; but I can tell Bill the
waiter--famous fellow, that Bill!--that you are one of my tenants, come
to complain of my steward, who has just distrained you for rent, you
dog! No wonder you look so worn in the rigging. Come, follow me. I can't
walk with thee. It would look too like Northumberland House and the
butcher's abode next door taking a stroll together."

"Really, Mr. Pepper," said our hero, colouring, and by no means pleased
with the ingenious comparison of his friend, "if you are ashamed of my
clothes, which I own might be newer, I will not wound you with my--"

"Pooh! my lad, pooh!" cried Long Ned, interrupting him; "never take
offence. I never do. I never take anything but money, except, indeed,
watches. I don't mean to hurt your feelings; all of us have been poor
once. 'Gad, I remember when I had not a dud to my back; and now, you see
me,--you see me, Paul! But come, 't is only through the streets you need
separate from me. Keep a little behind, very little; that will do. Ay,
that will do," repeated Long Ned, mutteringly to himself; "they'll take
him for a bailiff. It looks handsome nowadays to be so attended; it
shows one had credit once!"

Meanwhile Paul, though by no means pleased with the contempt expressed
for his personal appearance by his lengthy associate, and impressed with
a keener sense than ever of the crimes of his coat and the vices of
his other garment,--"Oh, breathe not its name!"--followed doggedly
and sullenly the strutting steps of the coxcombical Mr. Pepper. That
personage arrived at last at a small tavern, and arresting a waiter
who was running across the passage into the coffee-room with a dish of
hung-beef, demanded (no doubt from a pleasing anticipation of a similar
pendulous catastrophe) a plate of the same excellent cheer, to be
carried, in company with a bottle of port, into a private apartment. No
sooner did he find himself alone with Paul than, bursting into a
loud laugh, Mr. Ned surveyed his comrade from head to foot through an
eyeglass which he wore fastened to his button-hole by a piece of blue
ribbon.

"Well, 'gad now," said he, stopping ever and anon, as if to laugh the
more heartily, "stab my vitals, but you are a comical quiz. I wonder
what the women would say, if they saw the dashing Edward Pepper,
Esquire, walking arm in arm with thee at Ranelagh or Vauxhall! Nay, man,
never be downcast; if I laugh at thee, it is only