for one cake, and sixpence for two eggs.--Now I'm in the tea trade
myself, you must know, and I contend that as things go, or at least as
things went before the Barbarian eye, as they call Napier, kicked up a
row with the Hong merchants, it's altogether a shameful imposition, and
I wonder people put up with it.

_Stranger_. Oh, sir, I don't know. I think that it is the charge all
over the country. Besides, it doesn't do to look too closely at these
things, and you must allow something for keeping up the coffee-room, you
know--fire, candles, and so on.

_Jorrocks_. But blow me tight, you surely don't want a candle to
breakfast by? However, I contends that innkeepers are great fools for
making these sort of charges, for it makes people get out of their
houses as quick as ever they can, whereas they might be inclined to stay
if they could get things moderate.--For my part I likes a coffee-room,
but having been used to commercial houses when I travelled, I knows what
the charges ought to be. Now, this room is snug enough though small, and
won't require no great keeping up.

_Stranger_. No--but this room is smaller than the generality of them,
you know. They frequently have two fires in them, besides no end of oil
burning.--I know the expense of these things, for I have a very large
house in the country, and rely upon it, innkeepers have not such immense
profits as many people imagines--but, as I said before, "live and let
live."

_Jorrocks_. So says I, "live and let live"--but wot I complains of is,
that some innkeepers charge so much that they won't let people live.
No man is fonder of eating than myself, but I don't like to pay by the