The Steam-Packet: A Tale of the River and the Ocean — page 87: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

62 THE STEAM PACKET. enjoying a good situation in the Custom-House, and residing, when at home, in Botolph Lane—a thoroughfare which runs, or rather limps, from Thames Street into Eastcheap, and which is chiefly inhabited by Jews, who pursue the lucrative avocation of orange merchants ; thus turning the lane aforesaid into a complete orange grove, remind- ing one of the avenues of Seville. Mr. Smale was not, however, of the | Jewish persuasion, he being a constant attendant at the chapel of Mr. Bangbible, the dissenting minister. Having studied the use of figures at school, Drinkwater Smale had them at his fingers’ ends before they were an inch and a quarter long; and consequently he knew full well how. to take care of number one. Miss Sarah Pifpaf ‘had been heard to say that he was very good-looking, and that his features were finely chiselled—although, to speak truly, if Nature had chiselled much longer she would have left him without any at all. For the rest, Drinkwater Smale had inherited an annual income of forty pounds a-year from his deceased and much lamented father, who was kicked into eternity by a cow-heel, to which he was perhaps too weakly attached, and who still lies (at least it is to be hoped so) be- neath a cypress in the Abney Park Cemetery. “ Delighted, my lord, to form your lordship’s acquaintance,” said Mr. Smale, elevating a four-and-ninepenny gossamer six inches from his red hair (Miss Sarah vowed it was auburn) and replacing it again. “Happy to know any friend of Pifpaf’s,” answered the tailor, with a patronising air which would have been on of an emperor. “‘T am really extremely obliged for your lordship’s condescension,’ said Mr. Smale, with another graceful bow. ‘¢ Any way in which my interest can serve you, Mr. Smale,” con- tinued Buckram, ‘command me. I am entirely at your service—and at that of any friend of my friend Pifpaf’s.”’ At this moment the worthy chairman was called aside by Mr. Rum- tutch upon some business; and Mr. Smale thought it a most desirable opportunity to avail himself of the proffered bounty of his lordship. ‘< My lord,” he began, shufiling about in a fidgetty manner, and playing with his watch-guard, “since your lordship is so kind—and as I may not have such another chance, seeing that I don’t often fall in with a real lord—although I have seen a great many imitation ones on the stage—I will just trouble your lordship with a little request ——”’ “ Speak, my dear fellow—speak !” exclaimed the sot-disant noble, with the same imperial dignity of manner which we have before noticed ;—“ speak, and your desires shall be fulfilled the moment we get back to London again.” Eomicbooks:. co