The Steam-Packet: A Tale of the River and the Ocean — page 189: what you’re looking at

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

140 THE STEAM PACKET, Gibbins, when, awaking from a nap upon a bench where his late companions had left him, he found himself alone in the room, through the casements of which the dawn was peeping, with the maps of grog upon the table before him. He rubbed his eyes, recalled to mind the events of the preceding evening, and, unbolting the front door, hurried back to the hotel where his master was staying. | “Never better than late,” said the commissioner, grinning signi- ficantly, as he opened the wicket for the returning truant. CHAPTER XV. WHEREIN THE FREAKS OF MR, BUCKRAM ARE FAIFHFULLY RECORDED.— CAPTAIN PENTONVILLE ALSO FANCIES HIMSELF IN A SCRAPE. Mr. Buckram was quite another man since he became possessed of Mr. Smale’s pocket-book, with its valuable contents ; and whenever he saw that gentleman accosting him, he remembered that he had ‘‘ some- thing particular to say to. Pifpaf,” or ““a devilish good thing to mention y ; to Pentonville.” By these means he (‘diag 3 ) | a | nN avoided the necessity of surrender- me I ar ss ing the treasure, to which he was | determined, as he expressed himself within his own mind, to adhere like masonry; or, in other words, - ‘* to stick to it like bricks and mortar.”” His impudence now became positively awful and alarming. He ordered the waiters about in all directions, commanded the most expensive wines to be served up at dinner, and suffered his tongue to perpetrate so many inaccuracies— vulgarly termed “lies,”—that- the Luminaries opened their mouths with astonishment, and actually forgot to eat their victuals in their anxiety to listen to his stories. It was in vain that Captain Pen- tonville kicked him under the table: his tongue rattled onward nine- teen to the dozen; and, had not the Luminaries been the most addle- pated cits in existence, the soz-disant nobleman would not have retained his borrowed plumage for a moment. “ Rumtutch, my dear fellow,” said Mr. Buckram; “I saw you busy Gomichbooks