Page:Fitzgerald - Pickwickian manners and customs (1897).djvu/40

 you please, mister." "He pointed to a narrow high-backed chair, placed on a platform; by the side of the chair was a machine of curious construction, from which protruded a long wire. 'Heady stiddy, mister.' He then slowly drew the wire over my head and down my nose and chin." Such was the "Profeel machine."

There are many antiquated allusions in Pickwick—which have often exercised the ingenuity of the curious. Sam's "Fanteegs," has been given up in despair—as though there were no solution—yet, Professor Skeat, an eminent authority, has long since furnished it.

"Through the button hole"—a slang term for the mouth, has been well "threshed out"—as it is called. Of "My Prooshian Blue," as his son affectedly styled his parent, Mr. Lang correctly suggests the solution, that the term came of George IV's intention of chang-