a pound of ’am, but you can come again, you know—­waste not want not.  Now take some muffins, do, pray.  Batsey, bring some more cream, and set the kidneys on the table, the Yorkshireman is getting nothing to eat.  Have a chop with your kidney, werry luxterous—­I could eat an elephant stuffed with grenadiers, and wash them down with a ocean of tea; but pray lay in to the breakfast, or I shall think you don’t like it.  There, now take some tea and toast or one of those biscuits, or whatever you like; would a little more ’am be agreeable?  Batsey, run into the larder and see if your Missis left any of that cold chine of pork last night—­and hear, bring the cold goose, and any cold flesh you can lay hands on, there are really no wittles on the table.  I am quite ashamed to set you down to such a scanty fork breakfast; but this is what comes of not being master of your own house.  Hope your hat may long cover your family:  rely upon it, it is cheaper to buy your bacon than to keep a pig”.  Just as Jorrocks uttered these last words the side door opened, and without either “with your leave or by your leave”, in bounced Mrs. Jorrocks in an elegant dishabille (or “dish-of-veal”, as Jorrocks pronounced it), with her hair tucked up in papers, and a pair of worsted slippers on her feet, worked with roses and blue lilies.

“Pray, Mister J——­,” said she, taking no more notice of the Yorkshireman than if he had been enveloped in Jack the Giant-killer’s coat of darkness, “what is the meaning of this card?  I found it in your best coat pocket, which you had on last night, and I do desire, sir, that you will tell me how it came there.  Good morning, sir (spying the Yorkshireman at last), perhaps you know where Mr. Jorrocks was last night, and perhaps you can tell me who this person is whose card I have found in the corner of Mr. Jorrocks’s best coat pocket?” “Indeed, madam”, replied the Yorkshireman, “Mr. Jorrocks’s movements of yesterday evening are quite a secret to me.  It is the night that he usually spends at the Magpie and Stump, but whether he was there or not I cannot pretend to say, not being a member of the free and easy club.  As for the card, madam...”  “There, then, take it and read it,” interrupted Mrs. J——­; and he took the card accordingly—­a delicate pale pink, with blue borders and gilt edge—­and read—­we would fain put it all in dashes and asterisks—­“Miss Juliana Granville, John Street, Waterloo Road.”

This digression giving Mr. Jorrocks a moment or two to recollect himself, he pretended to get into a thundering passion, and seizing the card out of the Yorkshireman’s hand, he thrust it into the fire, swearing it was an application for admission into the Deaf and Dumb Institution, where he wished he had Mrs. J——.  The Yorkshireman, seeing the probability of a breeze, pretended to have forgotten something at the Piazza, and stole away, begging Jorrocks to pick him up as he passed.  Peace had soon been restored; for the Yorkshireman had not taken above three or four