For its recovery, she offers some forty or fifty dollars
      reward—giving, in her advertisement, a very minute description of
      the gem, and of its settings, and declaring that, on its
      restoration at No. so and so, in such and such Avenue, the reward
      would be paid instanter, without a single question being asked. During the lady’s absence from home, a day or two afterwards, a
      ring is heard at the door of No. so and so, in such and such
      Avenue; a servant appears; the lady of the house is asked for and
      is declared to be out, at which astounding information, the
      visitor expresses the most poignant regret. His business is of
      importance and concerns the lady herself. In fact, he had the
      good fortune to find her diamond ring. But perhaps it would be as
      well that he should call again. “By no means!” says the servant;
      and “By no means!” says the lady’s sister and the lady’s
      sister-in-law, who are summoned forthwith. The ring is
      clamorously identified, the reward is paid, and the finder nearly
      thrust out of doors. The lady returns and expresses some little
      dissatisfaction with her sister and sister-in-law, because they
      happen to have paid forty or fifty dollars for a fac-simile of
      her diamond ring—a fac-simile made out of real pinch-beck and
      unquestionable paste. But as there is really no end to diddling, so there would be none
      to this essay, were I even to hint at half the variations, or
      inflections, of which this science is susceptible. I must bring
      this paper, perforce, to a conclusion, and this I cannot do
      better than by a summary notice of a very decent, but rather
      elaborate diddle, of which our own city was made the theatre, not
      very long ago, and which was subsequently repeated with success,
      in other still more verdant localities of the Union. A
      middle-aged gentleman arrives in town from parts unknown. He is
      remarkably precise, cautious, staid, and deliberate in his
      demeanor. His dress is scrupulously neat, but plain,
      unostentatious. He wears a white cravat, an ample waistcoat, made
      with an eye to comfort alone; thick-soled cosy-looking shoes, and
      pantaloons without straps. He has the whole air, in fact, of your
      well-to-do, sober-sided, exact, and respectable “man of
      business,” _par excellence_—one of the stern and outwardly hard,
      internally soft, sort of people that we see in the crack high
      comedies—fellows whose words are so many bonds, and who are noted
      for giving away guineas, in charity, with the one hand, while, in
      the way of mere bargain, they exact the uttermost fraction of a
      farthing with the other. He makes much ado before he can get suited with a boarding house. He dislikes children. He has been accustomed to quiet. His habits
      are methodical—and then he would prefer getting into a private
      and respectable small family, piously inclined. Terms, however,
      are no object—only he must insist upon settling his bill on the
      first of every month, (it is now the second) and begs his
      landlady, when he finally obtains one to his mind, not on any
      account to forget his instructions upon this point—but to send in
      a bill, and receipt, precisely at ten o’clock, on the first day
      of every month, and under no circumstances to put it off to the
      second. These arrangements made, our man of business rents an office in a
      reputable rather than a fashionable quarter of the town. There is
      nothing he more despises than pretense. “Where there is much
      show,” he says, “there is seldom any thing very solid behind”—an
      observation which so profoundly impresses his landlady’s fancy,
      that she makes a pencil memorandum of it forthwith, in her great
      family Bible, on the broad margin of the Proverbs of Solomon. The next step is to advertise, after some such fashion as this,
      in the principal business six-pennies of the city—the pennies are
      eschewed as not “respectable”—and as demanding payment for all
      advertisements in advance. Our man of business holds it as a
      point of his faith that work should never be paid for until done. “WANTED.—The advertisers, being about to commence extensive
      business operations in this city, will require the services of
      three or four intelligent and competent clerks, to whom a liberal
      salary will be paid. The very best recommendations, not so much
      for capacity, as for integrity, will be expected. Indeed, as the
      duties to be performed involve high responsibilities, and large
      amounts of money must necessarily pass through the hands of those
      engaged, it is deemed advisable to demand a deposit of fifty
      dollars from each clerk employed. No person need apply,
      therefore, who is not prepared to leave this sum in the
      possession of the advertisers, and who cannot furnish the most
      satisfactory testimonials of morality. Young gentlemen piously
      inclined will be preferred. Application should be made between
      the hours of ten and eleven A. M., and four and five P. M., of
      Messrs.

      “Bogs, Hogs, Logs, Frogs & Co.,
      “No. 110 Dog Street.”

      By the thirty-first day of the month, this advertisement has
      brought to the office of Messrs. Bogs, Hogs, Logs, Frogs, and
      Company, some fifteen or twenty young gentlemen piously inclined. But our man of business is in no hurry to conclude a contract
      with any—no man of business is ever precipitate—and it is not
      until the most rigid catechism in respect to the piety of each
      young gentleman’s inclination, that his services are engaged and
      his fifty dollars receipted for, just by way of proper
      precaution, on the part of the respectable firm of Bogs, Hogs,
      Logs, Frogs, and Company. On the morning of the first day of the
      next month, the landlady does not present her bill, according to
      promise—a piece of neglect for which the comfortable head of the
      house ending in ogs would no doubt have chided her severely,
      could he have been prevailed upon to remain in town a day or two
      for that purpose. As it is, the constables have had a sad time of it, running
      hither and thither, and all they can do is to declare the man of
      business most emphatically, a “hen knee high”—by which some
      persons imagine them to imply that, in fact, he is n. e. i.—by
      which again the very classical phrase _non est inventus_, is
      supposed to be understood.