The new man’s conformity with the various customs of the inmates is one of the most curious facts on record.  We have been favoured with the following table or scale by which time regulates the gradual advancement to perfection of a genuine “Fleety":—­

First Week.—­Ring; union-pin; watch; straps; clean boots; ditto shirt; shave; and light waistcoat.

Second Week.—­Slippers in passage; no straps to boots; rub on toe; dirty hall; fresh dickey; black vest; two days’ beard.—­[Exit ring.]

Third Week.—­Full-bosomed stock; one bracer; indication of white chalk on seat of duck trousers; blue striped shirt; no vest; shooting jacket; small imperial.—­[Exeunt union-pin and watch.]

Fourth Week.—­White collar; blue shirt; slippers various; boots a little over at heel; incipient moustache; silk pocket-handkerchief round neck; and a fortnight’s splashes on trousers.

Fifth Week.—­Red ochre outline of increased whiskers, flourishing imperial, and chevaux-de-frise moustache; dirty shirt; French cap; Jersey over-all; one slipper and a boot; meerschaum; dressing-gown; and principal seat at the free and easy.

Sixth.—­Everything in the “worser line;” called by christian name by their bed-maker; hold their tongues, in consideration of three weeks’ arrears, at four shillings a week; and then all’s done, and the inhabitant is complete.

* * * * *

ELEGANT PHRASES.

There are people now-a-days who peruse with pleasure the works of Homer, Juvenal, and other poets and satirists of the old school; and it is not unlikely that centuries hence persons will be found turning back to the pages of the writers of the present day (especially PUNCH), and we rather just imagine they will be not a little puzzled and flabbergasted to discover the meaning, or wit, of some of those elegant phrases and figures of speech so generally used by this enlightened and reformed age!  The following brief elucidation of a few of these may serve for present ignoramuses, and also for future inquirers.

That’s the Ticket for Soup.—­Is one of the commonest, and originated several years ago, we have discovered, after much study and research, when a portion of the inhabitants of this wicked lower globe were suffering under a malady, called by learned and scientific men “poverty,” and were supplied by the rich and benevolent with a mixture of hot water, turnips, and a spice of beef, under the name of soup.  There are two kinds of tickets for soups in existence in London at present—­

1.  The Ticket for Turtle Soup, or a ticket to a Lord Mayor’s Feast.  It is only necessary to add, these are in much request.

2.  The Ticket for Mendicity Society Soup.  Beggars and such-like members of society monopolize these tickets; and it has lately been discovered by a celebrated philanthropist that no respectable person was ever known to make use of one of them.  This is a remarkable fact, and worthy the attention of the anti-monopolists.  These tickets are bought and sold like merchandise, and their average value in the market is about one halfpenny.