"Oh, no comparison."
"I should like very much to have your Schneider's address. I am going to Southampton on my return to England. I suppose if I were to mention your name——"
"Lord, yes, that would be sure to do it. But he isn't a cheap tailor, mind you."
The "gent" was leaning his head out of window, nearly suffocated with suppressed laughter, and from time to time encouraging me with fierce winks to proceed.
"There," said my lathy patron, "I have written his address on one of my cards—just show him my name, and you'll find it all right."
"Pray, sir," I asked, as if suddenly eager in poultry, "when you left Southampton, what was the price of a young goose?"
This was too much for the "gent," who burst out into a fit of uncontrollable laughter. The viridity of the Southampton youth was great, but this laughter opened his eyes. He coloured, and exclaimed,—
"Oh, you want to chaff, do you? But it won't do. I sha'n't bite. I'm not such a fool as I look."
"That's very possible—Heaven forbid you should be!" said I; whereupon a fresh burst of laughter from snob primus, who vowed that the youth was "sold."
At the next station, lath left our carriage; and "gent" instantly began expressing to me his delight at the way I had "sold the snob;" which led to his becoming in turn communicative, and informing me that he had just "sacked a little tin," which it was his intention "to spend like a brick." From that moment I took him into my confidence. I have trained him. I have taught him how to dine—which he had once imagined consisted in eating what money could procure. I have taught him to live. He is no longer a snob; at least, he doesn't betray himself. But—and, damn my whiskers! this is the sad part of the business—it is the way with so many of them—now, just as he is becoming companionable, his purse is running low."