on each other, and if we insist on being scribblers we must consent to be
fed on. We must try to endure philosophically what we cannot help, and
ought not, I suppose, to wish to help.

It is the custom at our table to vary the usual talk, by the reading of
short papers, in prose or verse, by one or more of The Teacups, as we are
in the habit of calling those who make up our company. Thirty years ago,
one of our present circle--"Teacup Number Two," The Professor,--read a
paper on Old Age, at a certain Breakfast-table, where he was in the habit
of appearing. That paper was published at the time, and has since seen
the light in other forms. He did not know so much about old age then as
he does now, and would doubtless write somewhat differently if he took
the subject up again. But I found that it was the general wish that
another of our company should let us hear what he had to say about it. I
received a polite note, requesting me to discourse about old age,
inasmuch as I was particularly well qualified by my experience to write
in an authoritative way concerning it. The fact is that I,--for it is
myself who am speaking,--have recently arrived at the age of threescore
years and twenty,--fourscore years we may otherwise call it. In the
arrangement of our table, I am Teacup Number One, and I may as well say
that I am often spoken of as The Dictator. There is nothing invidious in
this, as I am the oldest of the company, and no claim is less likely to
excite jealousy than that of priority of birth.

I received congratulations on reaching my eightieth birthday, not only
from our circle of Teacups, but from friends, near and distant, in large
numbers. I tried to acknowledge these kindly missives with the aid of a
most intelligent secretary; but I fear that there were gifts not thanked
for, and tokens of good-will not recognized. Let any neglected
correspondent be assured that it was not intentionally that he or she was