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The gentleman didn’t specify what particular times he alluded to; nor did he say whether he objected to the present times, from a disinterested consciousness that they had done nothing very remarkable in producing himself.

‘The good old times, the good old times,’ repeated the gentleman. ‘What times they were! They were the only times. It’s of no use talking about any other times, or discussing what the people are in THESE times. You don’t call these, times, do you? I don’t. Look into Strutt’s Costumes, and see what a Porter used to be, in any of the good old English reigns.’

‘He hadn’t, in his very best circumstances, a shirt to his back, or a stocking to his foot; and there was scarcely a vegetable in all England for him to put into his mouth,’ said Mr. Filer. ‘I can prove it, by tables.’

But still the red-faced gentleman extolled the good old times, the grand old times, the great old times. No matter what anybody else said, he still went turning round and round in one set form of words concerning them; as a poor squirrel turns and turns in its revolving cage; touching the mechanism, and trick of which, it has probably quite as distinct perceptions, as ever this red-faced gentleman had of his deceased Millennium.