dear!' said the egotistical lady, 'don't talk of not being well.
We have been in SUCH a state since we saw you last!'--The lady of
the house happening to remark that her lord had not been well
either, the egotistical gentleman struck in: 'Never let Briggs
complain of not being well--never let Briggs complain, my dear Mrs.
Briggs, after what I have undergone within these six weeks. He
doesn't know what it is to be ill, he hasn't the least idea of it;
not the faintest conception.'--'My dear,' interposed his wife
smiling, 'you talk as if it were almost a crime in Mr. Briggs not
to have been as ill as we have been, instead of feeling thankful to
Providence that both he and our dear Mrs. Briggs are in such
blissful ignorance of real suffering.'--'My love,' returned the
egotistical gentleman, in a low and pious voice, 'you mistake me;--
I feel grateful--very grateful. I trust our friends may never
purchase their experience as dearly as we have bought ours; I hope
they never may!'

Having put down Mrs. Briggs upon this theme, and settled the
question thus, the egotistical gentleman turned to us, and, after a
few preliminary remarks, all tending towards and leading up to the
point he had in his mind, inquired if we happened to be acquainted
with the Dowager Lady Snorflerer. On our replying in the negative,
he presumed we had often met Lord Slang, or beyond all doubt, that
we were on intimate terms with Sir Chipkins Glogwog. Finding that
we were equally unable to lay claim to either of these
distinctions, he expressed great astonishment, and turning to his
wife with a retrospective smile, inquired who it was that had told
that capital story about the mashed potatoes. 'Who, my dear?'
returned the egotistical lady, 'why Sir Chipkins, of course; how
can you ask! Don't you remember his applying it to our cook, and