has been at that kind of thing for eighteen years, and whom Laglandee
has christened, '_Saecula saeculorum_!'"

"By Jove! I should rather think I did!"




A USEFUL HOUSE


Royamount's fat sides shook with laughter at the mere recollection of
the funny story that he had promised to his friends, and throwing
himself back in the great arm-chair, which he completely filled, _that
picker up of bits of pinchbeck_, as they called him at the club, at last
said:

"It is perfectly true, Bordenave does not owe anyone a penny and can go
through any street he likes and publish those famous memoirs of
sheriff's officers, which he has been writing for the last ten years,
when he did not dare to go out, and in which he carefully brought out
the characters and peculiarities of all those generous distributors of
stamped paper with whom he had had dealings, their tricks and wiles,
their weaknesses, their jokes, their manner of performing their duties,
sometimes with brutal rudeness and at others with cunning good nature,
now embarrassed and almost ashamed of their work, and again ironically
jovial, as well the artifices of their clerks to get a few crumbs from
their employer's cake. The book will soon be published and Machin, the
Vaudeville writer, has promised him a preface, so that it will be a most
amusing work. You are surprised, eh? Confess that you are absolutely