It is twelve o’clock at noon.  In a large room, ornamented by shelves of bottles and preparations, with varnished prints of medical plants and cases of articulated bones and ligaments, a number of young men are seated round a long table covered with baize, in the centre of whom an intellectual-looking man, whose well-developed forehead shows the amount of knowledge it can contain, is interrogating by turns each of the students, and endeavouring to impress the points in question on their memories by various diverting associations.  Each of his pupils, as he passes his examination, furnishes him with a copy of the subjects touched upon; and by studying these minutely, the private teacher forms a pretty correct idea of the general run of the “Hall questions.”

“Now, Mr. Muff,” says the gentleman to one of his class, handing him a bottle of something which appears like specimens of a chestnut colt’s coat after he had been clipped; “what’s that, sir?”

“That’s cow-itch, sir,” replies Mr. Muff.

“Cow what?  You must call it at the Hall by its botanical name—­dolichos pruriens.  What is it used for?”

“To strew in people’s beds that you owe a grudge to,” replies Muff; whereat all the class laugh, except the last comer, who takes it all for granted, and makes a note of the circumstance in his interleaved manual.

“That answer would floor you,” continues the grinder.  “The dolichos is used to destroy worms.  How does it act, Mr. Jones?” going on to the next pupil—­a man in a light cotton cravat and no shirt collar, who looks very like a butler out of place.

“It tickles them to death, sir,” answers Mr. Jones.

“You would say it acts mechanically,” observes the grinder.  “The fine points stick into the worms and kill them.  They say, ’Is this a dagger which I see before me?’ and then die.  Recollect the dagger, Mr. Jones, when you go up.  Mr. Manhug, what do you consider the best sudorific, if you wanted to throw a person into a perspiration?”

Mr. Manhug, who is the wag of the class, finishes, in rather an abrupt manner, a song he was humming, sotto voce, having some allusion to a peer who was known as Thomas, Lord Noddy, having passed a night at a house of public entertainment in the Old Bailey previous to an execution.  He then takes a pinch of snuff, winks at the other pupils as much as to say, “See me tackle him, now;” and replies, “The gallery door of Covent Garden on Boxing-night.”

“Now, come, be serious for once, Mr. Manhug,” continues the teacher; “what else is likely to answer the purpose?”

“I think a run up Holborn-hill, with two Ely-place knockers on your arm, and three policemen on your heels, might have a good effect,” answers Mr. Manhug.

“Do you ever think you will pass the Hall, if you go on at this rate?” observes the teacher, in a tone of mild reproach.

“Not a doubt of it, sir,” returns the imperturbable Manhug.  “I’ve passed it twenty times within this last month, and did not find any very great difficulty about it; neither do I expect to, unless they block up Union-street and Water-lane.”