Killed By The Natives.

the hig hwayman , the Right Hon . W . E . Gladstone , the Tichborne Claimant , ]\ £ r . Peace , the burglar—eminence in any . line has irresistible attractions for me . Historians ' but they are not always reliable , have recorded that as Mr . Dando grew famous when his lineaments became well-known—literally better known than trusted—his appearance in—say the Haymarket , or Cheapside , or the Poultry—would produce consternation . Dismay woidd seize on the soul of Scott ; Sweeting would sweat with apprehension his shutters

Pimm would put up . But , depend upon it , dear readers , these are but the fables of the chroniclers . For why ? These purveyors had at aR times the remedy in their own hands . They might refuse to purvey . They might require payment in advance . No : Dando never spoilt his market by indiscreet , too frequent , or ill-chosen avatars . He applied the doctrine of permutation , and for ten years flourished and fattened on the choice growth of Colchester and Whitstable ,

For this philosopher had adroitly calculated that the personnel—the staff , that is to say—of an ordinary oyster shop changes , at least once , in two or three years . Study of the "Post Office London Directory "—even of that ridiculously diminutive publication as it appeared in the consecutive years , ' 35 to ' 40—assured him that , talcing in the sui-burban greengrocers—who in those days traded in the delicacy—there were purveyors of the comestible sufficiently numerous to enable him to dispense with the necessit of

y visiting the same one twice within a reasonable interval ; thus his risk of identification was reduced to a minimum—thus , the metropolitan oyster-bed was all before him—where —with due discrimination—to choose ; and when , like Alexander , he had conquered that extensive realm , why he could either reperambulate his ground , or recruit himself in the provinces , wherein he could rehearse a new metropolitan campaign . I have reason to believe that be was carrying out the latter part of the

programme I have above imperfectly sketched when that "fell serjeant Death , " not to be eluded as he had many and many a time with complacent defiance evaded the mortal " bobby , " " run him in" about the year' 45 . Reqidescat in pace . Si monumentum r equina circumspice , and yon had better do it in the streets of London on August 5 th , Oyster Day . " Please to remember the grotto . " *

No ! Oysters ancl innocence won t go together any more than singing birds and unsophistication . This is a dark saying : let me proceed to enli ghten a perplexed world . Now , I do not care to deny that I am very fond of oysters . A critic , for whose opinion I entertain—nay , I am bound to entertain—a profound respect , sometimes rather cynically asserts that my character is illustrated b y a predilection which shefor the observer is a lady—has remarked to have been onl y very recently displayed .

" It is just like you , " says the fair censor ; " when oysters were at a price within the reach of a moderate income you never cared for them ; now that they can only he obtained at a rate that a moderate indidgence in them woidd' ruin anyone possessing less than the means of the Marquis of Westminster or Lad y Contts—now that they rule so high that even the poor Prince of Wales has to hesitate before he feels justified in treating himself to a dozen , you crave them , and pretend—for it must be only

affectation—that you actually enjoy them . It is onl y another instance of that apebig the acquisition of aristocratic tastes which is such a conspicuous blot upon your otherwise estimable character . . It is is just like , " and so on , and so on , ancl so on . Now , when this austere young female speaks about oysters ruling " high , " lest she should be misunderstood , let me make it quite plain to the uncommercial mincl that she does not employ that adjective in the same sense in which it is used when we speak of the

condition of the bivalves said to have been desiderated by His late Majesty King George the Second . The delay involved in the protracted journey—close packed in the boot of a lumbering German Schnell Post—between the Dutch coast and the palatial magnificence of Herrenbausen , conduced to the exquisite flavour , from His Teutonic Majesty's point of view , of the succulent delicacy ; but the employer of the term " high , " in the above wholly supposititious review of . my tastes—herself exceedingly addicted to