sister cities, and of whose merits strangers, for divers reasons,
have had occasion to speak with great confidence.

"When the newspapers had faithfully recorded my arrival and given an
undoubted history of my doings in politics, I was to be introduced
to the Collector and Postmaster, both of whom, though differing with
me on great national questions, would receive me as became gentle-
men. The Mayor, too, would receive me at the City Hall, in presence
of the Common Council, and review the police, which body of men had
become, under the new order of things, more devoted to beards and
brandy than the good order of the city. He said I must be careful
not to accept the invitations of councilmen to drink, for they were
sure to saddle the payment upon their guest, to say nothing of their
lately adopted art of making invitations a means of supplying their
own wants in the article of liquor. And as drinking had become their
most distinguishing characteristic, perhaps it would not be amiss to
defend myself, he said, after the fashion of our smaller
politicians, who, as a general thing, invited councilmen to confer
with them at the bar, and left the settlement to be arranged between
them and the host.

"On finishing our tea, the General was kind enough to say he would
show me over the city. He could not, however, introduce me to the
Coon-club that night, seeing that it had adjourned and gone on a
frolic. Only too glad to accept the services of a companion so
valuable, I joined him, and we were soon at the door of the Broadway
Theater, where the General, to his great surprise, discovered that
in the change of his vest that evening (he had foregone the pleasure
of a very fashionable party in the Fifth Avenue to do me ample
honor) he had omitted to replace his purse. I begged he would not