They showed Mr. Punch and Father TIME up the front steps, and ushered them into a large hall.  It was thronged with a crowd of dirty and raggedly-dressed people, and partitioned off by a handsome and massive mahogany counter, beyond which sat a staff of clerks busily engaged in keeping the books and generally discharging the duties of the institution.

[Illustration]

“Ha, Mrs. MACSTOGGINS, and are we in your debt again?” asked the Agent of a beetle-browed woman of a sinister and forbidding expression, who was thrusting a paper across the counter to the cashier.

“Yes; and I’ll trouble you not to keep me waiting, either—­seeing that it’s gone three days since the burial.”

“Is this woman demanding the insurance money for the burial of her own child?” asked Mr. Punch, sternly.  And he turned his ring.  “And pray, Madam,” he continued, addressing the beetle-browed woman, “tell me the truth.”

“Certainly,” replied the woman, as if in a trance.  “First, I insured my own KATE—­then I starved her to death, and took the money.  Then little BILL followed.  I let him catch cold in the winter, and gave him a night or two on the stones, and that finished him.  Then came TIM FLAHERTY, and I managed him with the beetle-poison, and—­”

“Come,” said Mr. Punch, taking Father TIME’s arm once more; “let us get out of this—­I can’t breathe here.”

Scarcely had they quitted the place ere they had to encounter an appeal for custom, the Applicant being apparently one of the big guns in the Mercury wine trade, and he was not long in importuning Mr. Punch just to step inside his office, and sample a delicious Lafitte of the 1874 vintage.

“Now, try that, Sir,” he said, at the same time offering Mr. Punch a glass of the rich ruby-coloured beverage, “and tell me what you think of it.  We have a small parcel of it still left, and could let you have it at the remarkably low figure of 112s. the dozen.”

“It looks all right,” drily replied Mr. Punch, “but I can’t think how you can sell it at the price.”  Then holding up the glass critically, and turning his ring, continued, “How do you manage it?”

“How do I manage it?” replied the unconscious merchant, laughing heartily at the apparent joke.  “Why, my dear Sir, there’s not much difficulty about that.  I just make it myself.  Listen to my receipt:—­

  “Potato spirit—­that the ‘body’ finds;
    And then, as for colour,
    Be it brighter or duller,
  You see I am supplied with several kinds,
  And as to flavour, I get that desired,
  By adding various poisons as required.

[Illustration]

Ha! ha!  Let me send you in a few dozen.”  He offered Mr. Punch an elaborate price-list as he concluded his self-condemnatory verse with an obsequious bow.

“Come,” said Mr. Punch, once more taking hold of his aged companion’s arm, without condescending to give the cheating tradesman any reply, “come—­let us get out of this.  ’Pon my word, I think we’ve almost had enough of Mercury!”