t'), had him created a baronet, and returned for
the borough of One Vote."

CHARLES DICKENS ON BEARS' GREASE AND ITS PRODUCERS.

Any one who has been long resident in London, or who has passed through
Fenchurch Street, or Everett Street, Russell Square, must have been
struck with the way in which "bears' grease" is or used to be advertised
in these localities. Dickens makes Mr Samuel Weller tell of an
enthusiastic tradesman of this description.[32]

"His whole delight was in his trade. He spent all his money in bears,
and run in debt for 'em besides, and there they wos a growling away in
the front cellar all day long and ineffectually gnashing their teeth,
vile the grease o' their relations and friends wos being retailed in
gallipots in the shop above, and the first floor winder wos ornamented
with their heads; not to speak o' the dreadful aggrawation it must have
been to 'em to see a man always a walkin' up and down the pavement
outside, with the portrait of a bear in his last agonies, and
underneath, in large letters, 'Another fine animal was slaughtered
yesterday at Jenkinson's!' Hous'ever, there they wos, and there
Jenkinson wos, till he was took very ill with some inward disorder, lost
the use of his legs, and wos confined to his bed, vere he laid a wery
long time; but sich wos his pride in his profession even then, that
wenever he wos worse than usual the doctor used to go down-stairs, and
say, 'Jenkinson's wery low this mornin', we must give the bears a stir;'
and as sure as ever they stirred 'em up a bit, and made 'em roar,
Jenkinson opens his eyes, if he wos ever so bad, calls out, 'There's the
bears!' and rewives agin."

The author of a most amusing article in the seventy-seventh volume of
the _Edinburgh Review_, on the modern system of advertising, records
that, in his puff, the first vendor of bears' grease cautioned his
customers to wash their hands in warm water after using it, to prevent
them from assuming the hairy appearance of a paw.

A BEARABLE PUN.

An illiterate vendor of beer wrote over his door at Harrowgate, "_Bear_
sold here." "He spells the word quite correctly," said Theodore Hook,
"if he means to apprise us that the article is his own _Bruin_."[33]

[Illustration: Polar Bear. (Thalassarctos maritimus.)]

SHAVED BEAR.

Robert Southey ("Common-Place Book," 4th ser., p. 359) says:--"At
Bristol I saw a shaved monkey shown for a fairy; and a shaved bear, in a
check waistcoat and t