arm of each, he gained the door without any adventure worth noting, save
that, being kept back by the crowd for a few moments, the moralizing
Augustus Tomlinson, who honoured the moderate Whigs by enrolling himself
among their number, took up, _pour passer le temps_, a tall gold-headed
cane, and weighing it across his finger with a musing air, said, "Alas!
among our supporters we often meet heads as heavy, but of what a
different metal!" The crowd now permitting, Augustus was walking away
with his companions, and, in that absence of mind characteristic of
philosophers, unconsciously bearing with him the gold-headed object of
his reflection, when a stately footman, stepping up to him, said, "Sir,
my cane!"

"Cane, fellow!" said Tomlinson. "Ah, I am so absent! Here is thy cane.
Only think of my carrying off the man's cane, Ned! Ha, ha!"

"Absent indeed!" grunted a knowing chairman, watching the receding
figures of the three gentlemen; "body o' me! but it was the cane that
was about to be absent!"