increased in value. I found, too, that about a thirtieth part of the
annual revenue was now expended on the purposes commemorated in the
inscription over the door; the rest being handsomely laid out in
Chancery, law expenses, collectorship, receivership, poundage, and other
appendages of management, highly complimentary to the importance of the
six Poor Travellers. In short, I made the not entirely new discovery
that it may be said of an establishment like this, in dear old England,
as of the fat oyster in the American story, that it takes a good many men
to swallow it whole.

"And pray, ma'am," said I, sensible that the blankness of my face began
to brighten as the thought occurred to me, "could one see these
Travellers?"

"Well!" she returned dubiously, "no!"

"Not to-night, for instance!" said I.

"Well!" she returned more positively, "no. Nobody ever asked to see
them, and nobody ever did see them."

As I am not easily balked in a design when I am set upon it, I urged to
the good lady that this was Christmas-eve; that Christmas comes but once
a year,--which is unhappily too true, for when it begins to stay with us
the whole year round we shall make this earth a very different place;
that I was possessed by the desire to treat the Travellers to a supper
and a temperate glass of hot Wassail; that the voice of Fame had been
heard in that land, declaring my ability to make hot Wassail; that if I
were permitted to hold the feast, I should be found conformable to
reason, sobriety, and good hours; in a word, that I could be merry and