slow way up a narrow staircase, at the
risk of constant concussions with frantic
Mincing Lane men.  We found ourselves in
a broker's office, and thence in his sample-
room. This was a large square apartment
with wide counters extending round
the four sides, and several tables and stands
across the centre. On these lay papers
containing various odd-looking, unpleasant-smelling
substances. My attention was chiefly
attracted by a number of rows of pretty-
looking bottles, containing some pale bright
liquid, which several of the "Lane men"
were busily sipping, smacking their lips after
each taste, with uncommon relish. I inquired
if the thin-looking bottles contained
Johannesberg or Tokay ? "No," I was answered,
"castor-oil!" After that, I was prepared to
find the "Lane men" hob-an-nobbing in laudanum
or nibbling lumps of jalap or aloes.

The time appointed for the sale approached;
and, leaving the dark brokers' offices, we did
our best to reach Garraway's, where the
auction of these articles takes place. Scores
of clerks and principals were proceeding
from the Lane towards the same spot.
We hurried along Fenchurch Street, across
Gracechurch Street, and up a part of
Lombard Street, following close in the rear of a
rather portly broker, who cleared a way for
us in quite an easy off-hand manner, that was
very pleasant to us; but not so agreeable to
the six men who were offering toasting-forks
and wash-leather bags for sale at the corner of
Birchin Lane. I never could account for the
extraordinary demand existing for those two
articles in that neighbourhood; unless it be
that bankers' clerks indulge freely in toast-
and-water, and carry their dinners to office
in the leather bags.

Out of Birchin Lane, down one narrow
passage to the left, and round another straight
forward, and there was Garraway's. We
soon lost sight of the pictures in frames for
sale outside, and turned to study the pictures
out of frames inside. In the dark, heavy-
looking coffee-room, there were assembled
some of the mightiest City potentates,—the
Alexanders, Nimrods, and Cæsars of the
drug and dye world. I drew in my breath
as I viewed that knot of stout, well-favoured
persons, congregated at the foot of the old-
fashioned staircase leading to the public
sale-room above. I trod those stairs lightly,
half in veneration, and laid my hand gently
and respectfully on the banisters that I knew
must have been pressed of old by mighty men
of commerce. Down those wide sweeping stairs
many had oftentimes tripped lightly
homewards, after a day of golden labour, laden
with the fruit of the fabled garden:
sometimes, too, with gloomy brows, and feverish,
flushed faces.

What a strange scene presented itself in
the sale-room, when, by dint of scuffling and
squeezing, we managed to force our way in.
There could not have been a man left in all
Mincing Lane, to say nothing of Fenchurch
Street. The fog had come up the stairs and
choked up the gas-lights, as effectually as
though all the Lane men had been smoking
like double Dutchmen. The queer little
pulpit was shrouded in a yellow haze. The
windows were completely curtained, half
with cobwebs, half with fog. The sale was
about to commence, and the din and war
of words got to be bewildering; whilst
hundreds of pens were plunging madly into
invisible inkstands, and scratching imaginary
sentences and figures upon myriads of
catalogues.

Suddenly a cry burst upon my ear so dolefully
and shrilly, that I fancied somebody had
fallen down the old-fashioned staircase. It
was only the "house-crier," proclaiming in a
painful, distracted sort of voice, that the sales
were "on." Every man to his place, if he can
find one! Old musty brokers, of the last
century, with large watch seals, white cravats, and
double chins, grouped together in one dark
corner: youthful brokers, with very new
hats, zephyr ties, and well-trained whiskers,
hovered about the front of the auctioneer's
pulpit: rising brokers, with inky hands,
upturned sleeves of dusty coats, and an infinity
of papers protruding from every pocket, were
in all parts of the room ready to bid for
anything. Ranged against the walls on either
side were scores of incipient brokers—the lads
of the Lane. Hundreds of pens began to
scratch upon catalogues; hundreds of voices
were hushed to a low grumbling whisper. The
first seller (every vendor is an auctioneer at
Garraway's) mounted the tribune, and the
curious work began. My former experience
had shown salesmen to be anxious to make
the most of everything, and strive, and puff,
and coax, and dally, until they felt
convinced the utmost farthing had been bid;
and then, and not until then, did the "going,
going," merge into the "gone," and the
coquetting hammer fell. But those were
evidently old-fashioned, disreputable sales.
They don't stand any nonsense at Garraway's.
There is no time to consider. The biddings
fly about like lightning. Buying and selling
at Garraway's is done like conjuring—the
lots are disposed of by hocus-pocus. So rapidly
does the little nubbly hammer fall on the
desk, that one might well imagine himself
near an undertaker's shop with a very lively
business.

I said that the first "seller" was one of
the rising men, with dark bushy whiskers, a
sharp twinkling eye that was everywhere at
once, and a strong piercing voice. He let off his
words in sharp cracks like detonating balls.
By way of starting pleasantly, he flung himself
into an attitude that looked like one of stark
defiance, scowling with his dark eyes on the
assembled buyers, as though they were
plotting together to poison him with his own
drugs. Up went the first lots: a pleasant
assortment of nine hundred cases of castor-