way with a sneer, and tell him that all this is
plausible and pretty; but that we do not concern ourselves with any
thing but what is practicable.

In conformity to these ideas, I beg leave, my lord, to recal the
fantastic wishes that have just escaped me. To be corporeal is our
irrevocable fate, and we will not waste our time in fruitlessly accusing
it. My lord, I have one or two little expedients to offer to you, which,
though they do not amount to a perfect remedy in this case, will yet, I
hope, prove a tolerable substitute for those diabolical forms of which I
was talking.

I need not put your lordship in mind how friendly to such practices as
ours, is the cover of darkness, and how convenient those little machines
commonly called back-stairs. I dare say even your lordship, however
inconsequently you may often conduct yourself, would scarcely think of
mid-day as the most proper season of concealment, or the passing through
a crowded levee, the most natural method of entering the royal closet
unobserved.

But, my lord, you will please to recollect, that there are certain
attendants upon the person of the sovereign whom I find classed in that
epitome of political wisdom, the Red Book, under the name of pages. Most
wise is the institution, (and your lordship will observe that I am not
now deviating into the regions of fable) which is common to all the
Eastern courts, of having these offices filled by persons, who, upon
peril of their life, may not, in any circumstances whatsoever, utter a
word. But unfortunately in the western climates in which we reside, the
thing is otherwise. The institution of mutes is unknown to us. The lips
of our pages have never been inured to the wholesome discipline of the
padlock. They are as loquacious, and blab as much as other men. You
know, my lord, that I am fond of illustrating the principles I lay down
by the recital of facts. The last, and indeed the only time that I ever
entered the metropolis, I remember, as my barber was removing the hair
from my nether lip:--My barber had all that impertinent
communicativeness that is incident to the gentlemen of his profession;
he assured me, that he had seen that morning one of the pages of the
back-stairs, who declared to him, upon the word of a man of honour, that
he had that moment admitted a certain nobleman by a private door to the
presence of his master; that the face of the noble lord was perfectly
familiar to him, and that he had let