Through all his miserable wanderings I tracked him, for he
kept playbills, and each bill suggested some quaint or sordid memory. I
felt something like a lump in my throat when he said, "Now, dear friend,
at this place I played once the 'The Stranger' and 'The Idiot Witness,'
and for two days my comrade and I had nothing to eat. On one eventful
night we saw some refuse fish being wheeled off in a barrow, and we
begged leave to abstract a fish, which was--I say it without fear of
contradiction--the knobbiest and scaliest member of the finny tribe.
Sir, we tried to skin this animal and failed. Then we scraped him, and
the moving question arose, What about fire? Luckily the landlady had
left a lamp on the stairs. My inventive faculties were bestirred. The
LAMP! No sooner said than the fish was placed on the fire-shovel, and we
then took turns to move the shovel backwards and forwards over the lamp.
Regardless of that woman's loud inquiries about the smell, which was in
truth, sir, very overpowering, we pursued our joint labours until two in
the morning, and then the brute was only _half_ raw.
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