[Vlog-mode-discuss] "Billiards perhaps, and filthy cigars,

[Fredricks <pre...@te...>]

 out of your cerebral vertebrae or your popliteal space? We have long
been derided and scoffed at for making connubialism marketable, and
putting a price on a wife's infidelity, but it strikes me this is
something worse; for what, after all, is a rib--a false rib,
too--compared with the whole bony skeleton? "Allah is Allah," said the
Turkish admiral to Lady Hester Stanhope, "but I have got two anchors
astern," showing that, with all his fatalism, he did not despise what
are technically called human means. So the reverend Archdeacon, going
down for his sea-baths, might say, "I'm not quite sure they'll carry me
safely, but it shall not be all misfortune--I'll take out some of it in
money." The system, however, has its difficulties; for though it is a
round game, the stakes are apportioned with reference to the rank and
condition of the winner--as, for instance, the Solicitor-General's
collarbone is worth a shoemaker's whole body, and a Judge's patella is
of more value than a dealer in marine stores and his rising family. This
is a tremendous pull against the company, who not only give long, but
actually incalculable odds; for while Mr Briggs of the second class can