PASSAGE IN THE LIFE OF MR. WATKINS TOTTLE. 137 



the view of making her her confidante, and go-between, that Mrs. 

 Parsons informed this elderly gentleman, Mr. Tottle, of the circum- 

 stance, and that he, in the most kind and delicate terms, offered to 

 assist us in any way, and even undertook to convey this note, which 

 contains the promise I have long sought in vain an act of kind- 

 ness for which ' I can never be sufficiently grateful." 



" Good night, Timson," said Parsons hurrying off, and lugging 

 the bewildered Tottle with him. 



" Won't you stay and have something .?" said Timson. 



" No, thank ye," replied Parsons, " I've had quite enough;" and 

 away he went, followed by Watkins Tottle in a state of stupefaction. 



Mr. Gabriel Parsons whistled until they had walked some quarter 

 of a mile past his own gate, when he suddenly stopped and said, 



" You are a clever fellow, Tottle, an't you ?" 



" I don't know," said the unfortunate Watkins. 



" I suppose you'll say this is Fanny's fault, won't you ?" inquired 

 Gabriel. 



" I don't know any thing about it," replied the bewildered Tottle. 



" Well, said Parsons," turning on his heel to go home, " the next 

 time you make an offer, you had better speak plainly, and don't 

 throw a chance away ; and the next time you're locked up in a 

 spunging-house, just wait there till I come and take you out, there's 

 a good fellow." 



How, or at what hour, Mr. Watkins Tottle returned to Cecil-street 

 is unknown. His boots were seen outside his bedroom-door next 

 morning, but we have the authority of his landlady for stating that he 

 neither emerged therefrom, or accepted sustenance for four-and- 

 twenty hours ; at the expiration of that period, and when a council of 

 war was being held in the kitchen on the propriety of summoning 

 the parochial beadle to break his door open, he rang his bell, and de- 

 manded a cup of milk-and-water. The next morning he went 

 through the usual formalities of eating and drinking as usual, but a 

 week afterwards he was seized with a relapse, while perusing the list 

 of marriages in a morning paper, from which he never perfectly re- 

 covered. 



A few weeks since, the body of a gentleman unknown was found 

 in the Regent's Canal. In the trousers-pockets were four shillings 

 and three-pence-halfpenny ; a matrimonial advertisement from a 

 lady, which bore the appearance of having been cut out of the Sun- 

 day Times ; a tooth-pick, and a card-case, which it is confidently 

 believed would have led to the identification of the unfortunate gen- 

 tleman, but for the circumstance of there being nothing but blank 

 cards in it. Mr. Watkins Tottle absented himself from his lodgings 

 shortly before. A bill which has not been taken up, was presented 

 next morning ; and a bill which has not been taken down, was soon 

 afterwards affixed in his parlour-window. He left ,a variety of 

 papers in the hands of his landlady the materials collected in his 

 wanderings among different classes of society which that lady has 

 determined to publish, to defray the unpaid expenses of his board 

 and lodging. They will be carefully arranged, and presented to the 

 public from time to time, with all due humility, by BOZ. 



M.M. No. 2. T 



