Mrs. Merdle Suggesteth that Dinner being finished, the Gentlement
will Smoke. In the meantime, she Discourseth.


"Now Merdle--now Colonel--I know you are waiting.
And thinking my talking to eating's a bar,
Still hoping, by tasting, my appetite sating,
Will give you the license to smoke a cigar.

[Illustration: "WILL GIVE YOU THE LICENSE TO SMOKE A CIGAR"]

Well then, I've done now, and hope too you've dined,
As well as down town where you dine for a shilling,
At Taylor's, or Thompson's, or one of the kind,
Where mortals are flocking each day for their filling;
Or else at the Astor where bachelors quarter,
Where port holes for windows give light to the room,
Far out of the region of Eve's every daughter,
So high they are stuck up away toward the moon.

Though as for the 'stuck up' no walls built of brick,
Or granite, or marble, or dirty red sand,
Could stick up a man who himself's but a stick,
An inch above where he would naturally stand.

To witness the truth of this final assertion,
I call you to witness the sticks at the door,