elsewhere; what are they but eight-and-six-penny worth of discomfort!  They will no more accommodate a decent foot than the old general would have turned his back in a charge, or cut off his grizzled mustachios.  If it wasn’t for the look of the thing, one might as well shove one’s foot into a box-iron.  We wouldn’t be the man that christened them, and take a trifle to meet the fighting old marshal, even in a world of peace; in short, they are ambulating humbugs, and the would-be respectables that wear ’em are a huge fraternity of “false pretenders.”  Don’t trust ’em, reader; they are sure to do you! there’s deceit in their straps, prevarication in their trousers, and connivance in their distended braces.  We never met but one exception to the above rule—­it was John Smith.  Every reader has a friend of the name of John Smith—­in confidence, that is the man.  We would have sworn by him; in fact, we did swear by him, for ten long years he was our oracle.  Never shall we forget the first, the only time our faith was shaken.  We gazed upon and loved his honest face; we reciprocated the firm pressure of his manly grasp; our eyes descended in admiration even unto the ground on which he stood, and there, upon that very ground—­the ground whose upward growth of five feet eight seemed Heaven’s boast, an “honest man”—­we saw what struck us sightless to all else—­a pair of Bluchers!

We did not dream his feet were in them; ten years’ probation seemed to vanish at the sight!—­we wept!  He spoke—­could we believe our ears?  “Marvel of marvels!” despite the propinquity of the Bluchers, despite their wide-spreading contamination, his voice was unaltered.  We were puzzled! we were like the first farourite when “he has a leg,” or, “a LEG has him,” i.e., nowhere!

John Smith coughed, not healthily, as of yore; it was a hollow emanation from hypocritical lungs:  he sneezed; it was a vile imitation of his original “hi-catch-yew!” he invited us to dinner, suggested the best cut of a glorious haunch—­we had always had it in the days of the Wellingtons—­now our imagination conjured up cold plates, tough mutton, gravy thick enough in grease to save the Humane Society the trouble of admonitory advertisements as to the danger of reckless young gentlemen skating thereon, and a total absence of sweet sauce and currant-jelly.  We paused—­we grieved—­John Smith saw it—­he inquired the cause—­we felt for him, but determined, with Spartan fortitude, to speak the truth.  Our native modesty and bursting heart caused our drooping eyes once more to scan the ground, and, next to the ground, the wretched Bluchers.  But, joy of joys! we saw them all! ay, all!—­all—­from the seam in the sides to the leech-like fat cotton-ties.  We counted the six lace-holes; we examined the texture of the stockings above, “curious three-thread”—­we gloated over the trousers uncontaminated by straps, we hugged ourselves in the contemplation of the naked truth.