DID YOU EVER?
Did you ever know a sentinel who could tell what building he was keeping guard over?
Did you ever know a cabman, or a ticket-porter, with any change about him?
Did you ever know a tradesman asking for his account who had not "a bill to take up on Friday?"
Did you ever know an omnibus cad who would not engage to set you down within a few yards of any place within the bills of mortality?
Did you ever know a turnpike-man who could be roused in less than a quarter of an hour, when it wanted that much of midnight?
Did you ever see a pair of family snuffers which had not a broken spring, a leg deficient, or half-an-inch of the point knocked off?
Did you ever know a lodging-house landlady who would own to bugs?
Did you ever know the Boots at an inn call you too early for the morning coach?
Did you ever know a dancing-master's daughter who was not to excel Taglioni?
Did you ever know a man who did not think he could poke the fire better than you could?
Did you ever know a Frenchman admire Waterloo Bridge?
Did you ever know a housemaid who, on your discovering a fracture in a valuable China jar, did not tell you it was "done a long time ago?" or that it was "cracked before?"
Did you ever know a man who didn't consider his walking-stick a better walking-stick than your walking-stick?
Did you ever know a penny-a-liner who was not on intimate terms with Lytton Bulwer, Capt. Marryat, Sheridan Knowles, Tom Hood, Washington Irving, and Rigdum Funnidos?
Did you ever know a hatter who was not prepared to sell you as good a hat for ten-and-sixpence as the one you've got on at five-and-twenty shillings?
Did you ever know a red-haired man who had a very clear notion of where scarlet began and auburn terminated?
Did you ever know a beef-eater go to the play in his uniform?
Did you ever know a subscriber to the Anti-Cruelty-to-Animals Society who didn't kick the cat?
Did you ever know a lady with fine eyes wear green spectacles?
Did you ever know an amateur singer without "a horrid bad cold?"
Did you ever see a cool fat woman in black in the dog-days?
Did you ever go to see Jack Sheppard without feeling a propensity to run home and rob your mother?
Did you ever know an author who had not been particularly ill-used by the booksellers?
Did you ever know fifty killed and fifty wounded by a railroad accident, without the fifty who were not killed being congratulated by the directors that they were only wounded?
Did you ever know a man who did not consider that he added ten years to his life by reading the "Comic Almanack?"
JULY—Long days and Long ears.