half companion. "This," My Uncle would say, pointing to the latter and addressing the former, "is the young woman who offered a very long table-cloth in pledge this morning," -which My Uncle would produce whilst speaking. “Yes Sir," the respectable-looking woman would reply. "This is the young person. And it is my property."-" She said," My Uncle would quietly proceed, "that it was her sister's property, and that her sister sent her."-"Yes Sir, it is quite correct, she did."-" Well! but you know," My Uncle would retort, glancing confidentially at the two, "you are not her sister?" แ "No Sir, I am not; I confess I am not. But a person don't wish to mention the exact truth when reduced to these necessities, and such was the instructions I giv' her. I am aware that it is not, strictly speaking, right fur to pervert the truth, and I am sorry for it now, since it has caused me a deal of trouble, and forced me to come a good distance.”—“I am sorry too, both to have stopped the table-cloth, and to have put you to any inconvenience," My Uncle would return, "but we are obliged to be cautious. Her account was not satisfactory, though not so unsatisfactory as to justify me in detaining her—and it's such a very long table-cloth! It might be a ship's table-cloth, for instance, not honestly come by, especially as the marking in the corner was illegible!" "So it might Sir, and I don't complain."-" Besides," My Uncle would proceed, "it's too long a table-cloth, for any table that you have in your house, you know?" "Certainly it is, Sir, but I used to keep a public-house. I kept the Fox and Grapes at Bow, for several years, and that table-cloth was used in the business." Then, My Uncle, reassured by his ears, as well as by his eyes, would roll it up, and say that he was glad to lend the matron the money that she wanted “ on it;" and the affair would be completed to the satisfaction of all parties.

The reader of the arbitrary gender would observe, perhaps, as the matron and the servant left the shop, another matron enter by the same genteel door, accompanied, to his thinking (though, of course, he is anything but suspicious), by a doubtful-looking little Niece, of thirteen years or so-doubtful as a Niece, because of her very strong resemblance to her Aunt. A plump little, comfortable, pippincheeked Aunt, mighty soft-spoken, and wrapped-up to her chubby chin in reputable furs. He would observe them come in, with a mincing pretence of enquiring on what terms the purchase of a great coat near the door could be effected-so, gradually, and without abatement of gentility, approach the counter, and slide into the shopman's hand (the immediate link of communication between Aunt and Shopman, being Niece) two duplicates for silver spoons. To the inquiry, "Do you wish to take 'em out?" he would observe Aunt's neck bend, swan-like in the affirmative, while Niece as the more artless spirit, said openly, " Please!” The strangeness of Aunt in such a place; her timid surprise, repressed by a continual effort; the expressive appeal of her gentility to the chivalrous feelings of the shopman; the mysterious gathering of her furs about her chin; the delicate way in which, when Niece has the spoons all safe, Aunt bends forward, to say in a fluttered whisper, as she draws her glove upon her short plump hand, "that there is a fishslice which she will probably require to redeem on Monday, and will the forenoon be a good time for coming unobserved ?" would not be lost upon him. But it is a thousand to one that he would be amused by this elaboration, because perfectly convinced that Aunt and Niece are quite as intimate with My Uncle as Mrs. Flathers herself is-just then going out, with her six bundles.

In Mrs. Flathers and the general customers, he would

find no pretence of shyness, either with My Uncle or with one another. In the intervals of not ungracious expostulations with "Charles" or "William," to " see if that shawl's down yet!" they would gossip about their husbands and their families, and Mrs. Walker's having come better through it than they had thought she would, after Walker's treatment of her as they might at any other place of assemblage. Their children, too: whether so young as to be taking their regular meals at My Uncle's, or to be staring at the gas and sucking their fists or so old as to be stood down in corners to poke their fingers into one another's eyes: would be found quite at home. Of little old men and women of an older growth, yet very knowing, and very observant of all the business done, there would be no want. Men would be

found (especially married men) a little out of place-rather awkward and shy-something hustled by the women-and sensible of its being better to leave such ordinary domestic affairs as pawnbroking to them. Girls from ten to fifteen would be seen highly to cherish this privilege, and to fly at boys of corresponding years like tigresses.

The transactions to be contemplated at My Uncle's on such an occasion would be of a singular and various nature. This woman would be "taking out" a sheet and a child's petticoat, pawned in the morning of that very day—most likely to provide her husband's dinner. That man would be redeeming a saw, which has been in My Uncle's keeping, hundreds of times-which is constantly passing in and out of his possession. And this, not because the man is a drunkard or an idler, but because he is a poor jobbing carpenter, without a penny of monied capital: who, when he has a small job in hand, and has done the sawing part of it and wants the nails and glue to finish it, pawns the saw to provide them, until he is paid and can redeem it.

Endless cases of this kind the reader would encounter. But he would see no pawning of "The Society's Bibles," which My Uncle refuses to receive, as possessions the poor do not usually acquire on terms that involve a right to dispose of them for money; and he would see no drunkenness for My Uncle flatly refuses to deal with men or women in a state of intoxication.

We would then survey My Uncle's stores of pledges upstairs, binned exactly like wine, and kept with as much order. Giving him a lamp in a lantern, as a necessary precaution against fire, and carrying one myself, I would show him floor above floor of these store-rooms; "the well" communicating with each; and a boy, with another lantern, and sundry duplicates, going about, searching for the bundles to which the latter refer. He should see how the seven shilling coats are all binned together in order of date; how the ten shilling coats are all binned together; and fifteen shilling coats, the pound coats. So with the shawls, so with the gowns, so with the petticoats, so with the trousers, so with the shirts, so with the waistcoats. And he should witness the surprising facility with which My Uncle can find in his great stock the least article that he wants. As to miscellaneous pledges, he should see plenty of them, although in a poor neighbourhood, common wearing apparel is the staple pawn. He should see some (but not many) bed, plenty of spades and flat-irons, alleys of clocks. He should roam among China figures, landscapes, fire-arms, fireirons, portraits, mathematical instruments, instruments of navigation, boots, shoes, umbrellas, fenders, fishing-rods, saddles, and bridles, fiddles, books, key-bugles, and hearthrugs.

Finally, he should come down-stairs again and have a talk with My Uncle. Then he should learn how poor peo

ple, in buying articles of sale from that part of My Uncle's mansion in which such things are displayed habitually ask what such a thing would fetch if it were offered in pawn; and frequently confess that they are influenced in their choice by their "handiness" in that regard. How this strange forethought is conspicuous in costermongers and fishwomen; the former often wearing great squab brooches convenient pledges, and the latter massive silver

as

rings.

Also, what wonderful things are offered in pawn.

How a child's caul is frequently offered. How Bank of England notes are often pawned for security's sake; especially by hop-pickers, who have no settled home. How gamblers have a superstitious idea that pawnbroker's money is lucky, and therefore pawn bank-notes in order to get pawnbroker's cash to play with. How a thousand pound note was once pawned by a gambler at a shop near Charing Cross.

Further. How a German nobleman took to a pawnbroker at the West End of London, only three years ago, his wife's patent of Spanish nobility. How the whole stock of an apothecary's shop, including pills, perfumery, draughts, bottles, ointments, counters, desks, pestles, mortars, scales, and infinitesimal weights, was once pawned, and remained unredeemed for two years; when it was taken out to be started in business in a fashionable neighbourhood. How there have been included among pawnbrokers' pledges such extraordinary articles as an immense dancing booth, well known at fairs and races; live parrots; several hundredweight of human hair; a travelling carrage complete; a horse and chaise; and some twelve thousand pounds worth (from one place in one year) of manufactured silk. How a thousand pounds was not long since lent on Manchester goods, which it took My Uncle and assistants four days to