hapless polar navigator, whose tarpaulin hat was visible between the animal's stupendous and inexorable jaws; the authentic portrait of the wonderful Fat Boy smiled, in bland obesity, on that of the French Giant in the opposite caravan, who was represented as looking down from a great altitude on a wondering gentleman in a blue surtout and brass buttons, whose shirt-frill reached about the giant's knee, and who was supposed to be a person of fashion who had paid his money for the pleasure of seeing him. The swelling of the canvas of these great pictures in the breeze imparted to the objects painted thereon a slow and solemn motion, which, giving a sort of unearthly life to their grim faces and steadfast attitudes, made them appear to Julius very awful. Everything was charming to Julius. If the fairies he was so fond of hearing about had carried him in a winged chariot to their own country, he could scarcely have been more delighted. His friend Rosa had provided him with an immense painted trumpet, which had taken his fancy, and had also held him up to look in at the glass of a peepshow. This had merely whetted his appetite for sight-seeing; and immediately on arriving in front of the rows of caravans where the wild beasts were stationed, he became clamorous for a sight of them. They did not, perhaps, come up to his ideal. He was a little disappointed at finding the lion so placable, for he merely winked at them as they passed in front of his den; the polar bear also declined showing any more than the rear of his person; while the Peruvian nightingale remained mystic as the phoenix, although Julius applied earnestly to a keeper in corduroy shorts and ankle boots to help him to a sight of that singular bird. The man laughed, and, saying "Look here, master!" pointed to a pelican; but Julius knew all about pelicans, and not only convicted the keeper of the attempted imposition, but gave him a short digest of pelican history from Buffon. Here we will leave him, making acquaintance with the monkeys charmed at recognizing the ostriches, and outrageous at not being permitted to ride on the zebra, while we look after other characters of our history. the ire that was flashed to wither him from the eyes of Noble. The corporal was a tall, slender fellow, of a somewhat roué and dissipated aspect; his forage-cap was set jauntily on one side of his wavy black hair, his mustache was evidently nurtured like some rare exotic, and he had a waist, as Kitty said, like an hour-glass. Miss Fillett's conduct was certainly aggravating. She had begun by whispering to Noble remarks on the uniform and general appearance of the object of his wrath, and, totally regardless of the gruff and short replies vouchsafed, had taken occasion to enlarge on the charms of military people in general and dragoons in particular. "There's a hair about thim," said Kitty, mincing her words to suit the subject there's a hair about thim not met with out of the army. Their manners is generally exquisite, and their O, did you ever see such a white hand, now he 's took his gloves off?" "D-n his hand!" muttered Noble. 66 "No gentleman's is whiter," pursued Kitty; and his eyes-law, how they do sparkle!-- don't they, Harry ?" "Do they?" said Harry shortly; then sotto voce, "I should like to bung 'em up." "And isn't his jacket beautiful?" whispered the enthusiastic Fillett. "Look at the lace on the front." "P'raps you may see it laced on the back presently," growled Noble, savagely grasping his stick, and unable longer to repress his displeasure. But Kitty pretended to think he was joking. She made nonsensical remarks, and then laughed loudly at them, to attract the attention of the corporal, and establish an understanding with him; while he, switching his boots with his cane, glanced at her with a coolly critical air, as if he was used to that sort of thing. How long Harry Noble's wrath might have taken to boil over, under these circumstances, is doubtful. Just as he was revolving in his mind some plausible reason for stepping up to the corporal, and inviting him into the next field to settle their claims, Lady Lee's party came in front of the booth, stopped for a moment, in their way down the street, by the crowd gathered round a huge bumpkin, who, incited thereto by ale and approbation, was performing a hornpipe in hobnailed shoes, leaving deep impressions of the nails in the road at every step. Kitty Fillett, after being introduced by Mr. Noble to all the shows, was refreshing herself, in that gentleman's society, in a neighboring booth. Mr. Noble, after having been very agreeable and attentive all the day, was now This disciple of Terpsichore, finding his in a most unchristian and desperate state of efforts well received, had procured a partner mind. This was caused by the presence of a whom he had danced into breathless exhausgood-looking corporal of dragoons, who had tion, and he was now looking round for a lounged in, after frequently passing and re- suitable fair one to supply her place. In his passing before them, apparently thinking exalted mood, Orelia's style of beauty apmuch more of the too favorable and admiring peared to him most likely to do him credit, glances which Kitty cast on him, than of and he accordingly pranced up, with the CCCCLXXII. LIVING AGE. VOL. I. 39 grace and vigor of one of his own ploughhorses, and seized her hand. Orelia snatched it away. "Wretch!" cried she, looking at him like an insulted queen "Begone!' "The fellow 's mad!" cried Doctor Blossom"get away, sir! Call a constable!" quoth the doctor, authoritatively, to the crowd in general, on seeing the man persist in his design. The dragoon corporal, leaving his contemplation of Miss Fillett, had lounged to the front of the booth, where he stood coolly scanning the ladies. He now stepped forward, and, interposing between the flushed and angry Orelia and her pertinacious assailant, seized the man by the collar, and hurled him violently back. unfortunate old legs, and handed them up to his stage, out of harm's way. Harry Noble, burning to avenge his wrongs on the dragoon, was meanwhile forcing his way through the crowd towards that redoubted personage, intending forthwith to disfigure permanently, by the bunging-up of eyes, loss of fore-teeth, and flattening of nose, the face that Kitty Fillett had found so charming Whether these fell designs would have beep executed, or whether Harry, coming for wool, might have gone home shorn, is not known, for the duel did not take place. Just as Harry's furious face, glaring on the corporal within a couple of yards, met the eye of the latter, and admonished him to look out for a fresh foe, a couple of horses' heads came between them. 66 The countryman was fully three stone "Hi! hi!" shouted the corpulent coachheavier than the trim soldier, and, recovering man, who drove the Lightning royal mail. himself, rushed at him in full confidence of By your leave there!-make a lane, will utterly annihilating him with one smashing ye? Give 'em a note, Jim" (to the guard). blow of his great fist. His brother bumpkins, unanimously indulging the same expectation, encouraged him by saying out, "Gi' ut un, Joe; d-n thee, gi' ut un!" and were proportionably astonished when the corporal threw himself into an easy attitude, and, by what appeared to their unscientific eyes the mere straightening of his right arm, sent his big antagonist to the earth like a slaughtered ox. The guard sounded his horn, and then flourished it, shouting, "Room for the mail!- make way there!" evidently lost in wonder at the effrontery of any person or persons daring to delay for an instant his majesty's mail; while a passenger, who sat on the box-seat, said, "Drive into the infernal scoundrels!" The coachman was by nature a choleric person, and his choler had been fed for many A tremendous row ensued. Some com- years with brandy and water, like a lamp. rades of the corporal's, who were near, set to He could ill brook hindrances of any kind, at once with a corresponding number of the and was scarcely to be stopped even by such countryman's friends, all actuated by a unani- decisive impediments as loss of linch-pins, mous impulse. Two or three officers, seeing impassable snow-drifts, and the like dispensathe red jackets gleaming fitfully amidst over- tions of Providence. Accordingly, having to powering masses of corduroy and fustian, cast choose between suppressing his wrath (which themselves into the fray, and were reinforced would certainly, by inducing apoplexy, have by a couple of Oxford men on a visit to their caused him to drop off his perch like an overfriends in the town, who, expecting to be fed goldfinch) and venting it forthwith, he ordained shortly, and to be debarred from chose the less fatal alternative, and touched the comfort of combating bargemen in future, up his leaders. Those noble animals, sidling embraced the present opportunity with grate- and curvetting, with the traces over their ful promptitude. Amateurs of Doddington backs, pushed on, and did great execution, were equally ready to exert their prowess terminating several pugilistic encounters with showmen were affected by the contagious ex-a suddenness that the most active Middlesex ample harlequins, descending from their magistrate, assisted by the rural police, might stages, ranged themselves against rival pan- have tried in vain to emulate. The warrior taloons, while Columbines screamed after in the tin helmet, before alluded to, and a them in vain; and the proprietor of the pugnacious Harlequin who had attacked him, French Giant took the opportunity of settling were prostrated in opposite directions. Harry a private and long festering grudge with the Noble was sent reeling into the very arms of owner of the Albino Lady. Kitty Fillett, who was shedding tears like a watering-pot; and other less eager belligerents quietly agreed to a cessation of hostilities, and cleared the way for the mail. The corporal showed himself a paladin in courtesy no less than in valor. He carefully interposed his person as a shield to the ladies, and the fray streamed away on each side as from a rock. Still, they might have been sadly jostled, had not the venerable merryandrew before mentioned hurried down his ladder, at the imminent risk of snapping his The Lightning was beginning to exchange its slow walk through the crowd for a slow trot, and the coachman's face was returning from deep ultra-marine to its natural lake tint, when Lady Lee, casting her eyes upon the coach, called aloud, “Oh, Colonel Lee! | front of them, to testify his satisfaction at the Colonel Lee!" colonel's arrival; Tom Jago, a woolcomber, who cared more for field-sports than for his trade, came up, touching his hat, to tell of some trampers having lately been seen netting the river for salmon; and Mrs. Susan Golightly, the buxom wife of an innkeeper, cast a merry glance from her black eyes as she welcomed the colonel back to Doddington-all of whom Bagot treated with a gracious and jocular familiarity, that fully maintained for him his position in the popular esteem. The passenger on the coach-box turned, and, instantly recognizing her ladyship perched on a stage within a yard or two of him, in company with her son, two young ladies, a merryandrew, and a juvenile tumbler, he did what all the people in the fair probably could n't have done, for, by a word and a touch on the arın, he caused the coachman to pull up while he descended; and, further, that impetuous charioteer, before proceeding on his way, respectfully touched his hat to him, as did the guard. 66 Bagot's first exclamation, on ascending the stage, was " God bless my soul!" Then, shaking Lady Lee's hand, and motioning with his head towards the aged merry-andrew, he said, You have n't joined the profession, have you, Hester?" for Bagot was a man who could be pleasantly facetious with ladies. "I'm so glad you 're come," said Lady Lee; "you can take care of us as far as the hotel, and go home in the carriage. My dears, this is Colonel Lee; and these are my friends, Miss Payne and Rosa Young.' The colonel, taking off his white felt hat, made a bow-rather a slang bow-to each, and then shook hands, first with Orelia, who gave him hers as if she expected him to go down on his knees and kiss it, and then with Rosa. He diffused round him a palpable halo, as it were, of brandy and water. He was dressed in the white hat just mentioned, a green neckcloth with white squares, a Newinarket cutaway, with a white greatcoat over it, and trousers buttoned at the ankles over drab gaiters. He had evidently been a goodlooking man before his nose grew so swollen, his forehead so flushed, his eyes so open and watery, and his under lip so protruding and tremulous. His hair was somewhat long at the sides and back, and grizzled to iron gray, as were his voluminous whiskers and the tuft on his under lip. The colonel, having shaken hands with them as aforesaid, and also with Julius, who plucked him by the skirts, and called him Uncle Bag," said, "Suppose we imitate Miss O'Neil, and retire from the stage"which they accordingly did, after acknowledging substantially the civility of the ancient merry-andrew, who stood bowing before them, while the fixed smile painted on his spotted face entirely contradicted his deferential attitude, and gave to the spectators the idea that he was openly making fun of the whole party. As they passed down the street to the hotel, Bagot frequently stopt to shake hands with people of all classes who came up to greet him farmers, whose grounds he sometimes shot over, held out their horny hands; Peter Pearce, a drunken shoemaker, left his stall, and danced a short distance down the street in CHAPTER IV. Bagot's visits to the Heronry were, for the most part, regulated by sporting events. He was a regular attendant at all great race meetings, and spent here the intervals, especially if his funds were low. The state of these funds was almost entirely dependent on his adroitness or good fortune in betting or at play, for Sir Joseph's legacy had dwindled down to a minute fraction on the settling day of the very first Derby after the testator's death. On the occasions of these visits, he and Lady Lee had always been entirely independent of each other. He had his own rooms, where he entertained his own companions, ordered his own meals, and led a free-and-easy bachelor life of it. He made himself useful by regulating the stable economy, and bringing the steward to book, as he termed it. On the evening of his arrival, Bagot walked over to Monkstone, the house already described as standing across the river, within view of the windows of the Heronry; and, as Bagot was not accustomed to pay visits of ceremony or friendship, we may state at once that he had an object in view. Monkstone had been purchased by an old gentleman, who, rising from low beginnings to considerable wealth, had conceived a wish, in his old age, to become the founder of a family. As he was an old bachelor, and had no intention of marrying, he cast about among his relatives for a suitable heir. Having selected a nephew, he took him into his house, and brought him up to consider himself the future successor to Monkstone; and dying a few years after, left him his sole heir. Mr. Jonathan Dubbley, this fortunate inheritor, had been considerably neglected both by nature and education. He was far from bright originally, and the dull surface of his mind was covered, when his uncle adopted him, with many years' rust. At his uncle's death, his estate and income were such as to give him consideration in the county, and he suddenly found himself a prominent character in scenes to which he was totally unaccustomed. He was a grand juryman - he was; a magistrate and J. P. His tenantry made him a man of consequence at elections; and, . 612 to crown his greatness, he had this year been caused the squire, as before said, to regard would have felt for a more respectable person. him with a much greater respect than he ally (though in a somewhat distant and He had not failed to hint to this potent sheepish way) his admiration for Lady Lee. Bagot had at first laughed at him, but, finding the squire's affections to be more seriously engaged than he had imagined, he began to consider in his own mind how he could best turn the circumstance to account. It was with the view of executing the result of his meditations that he now visited Monkstone, on the first day of his coming down into the country. On one point he now began to feel his deficiency more strongly than all the rest-he wanted a well-bred wife he wanted to marry a woman who should possess qualities to form a light, agreeable background to his own solid merits -one who should, as Mr. Tennyson expresses it, set herself to him "as perfect music unto noble words" the noble words being, in his case, four thousand a-year. After casting about among the eligible spinsters of his acquaintance, and taking counsel with the landlord of the Dubbley Arms and his own gamekeeper, he at length fixed upon Lady Lee as the most suitable match he could discover. She was known to be a woman of rabbit-shooting, taking off his half-boots and talent and striking address; anybody who gaiters in the hall. He was a good-looking He found Mr. Dubbley, just returned from had eyes could see she was handsome; and, man, about five-and-thirty, rather bald, with moreover, she would be by no means a dower- a cunning eye and an imbecile half-smile. On less bride, a circumstance that weighed power-seeing Bagot come up the steps, the squire fully in the calculations of Squire Dubbley, ran towards him in his worsted stockings, who had been taught fully to appreciate the with the knee-strings of his corduroy breeches value of money, and who was both tolerably dangling about his calves. acute and very obstinate where his own interests were concerned. The grand obstacle to a declaration of his wishes was an insuperable bashfulness with which the squire became afflicted when in the company of ladies of high degree, but which did not, however, affect him in his intercourse with the sex generally. bley, "I never was so glad to see anybody. Bagot. Squire Dubbley had a very great respect for Colonel Bagot Lee-greater, perhaps, than for any other person-not altogether because Bagot was a sharp fellow, for there" and most particular hungry. Just you go were fellows sharper than Bagot, of whom into the dining-room, colonel, and wait while the squire thought but little. In general, I wash my hands. I'll order another plate Mr. Dubbley disliked people who showed any to be laid." superiority to himself, which had the effect of narrowing his circle of esteemed friends He did not fail to remark several alterations considerably. When men shone, in his com- in the apartment. Some French (very French) Bagot accordingly entered the dining-room. pany, on subjects which he did not under-prints had been removed. stand, he would abuse them dreadfully behind plain furniture of old Mr. Dubbley's time was their backs say to his intimates that peo- replaced by the productions of a London The extremely ple might call such-a-one clever, but he was a upholsterer. Some books, too cursed bad shot-could n't hit a hay-stack; at Monkstone-in very grand bindings, lay or that he had no hand on a horse, and rode scattered about. Bagot took up one - rare objects like a tailor; with divers other slanders. an illustrated Life of Napoleon. Presently But Bagot's sharpness evinced itself in pur- the squire entered at another door, bearing it was suits congenial to the squire's tastes field-sports, in skill on the turf, and in knowl- under his arm. -in a cobwebbed bottle in each hand, and another edge of the dark corners of London life, to which he had last year introduced Dubbley," piloting him into various haunts, where the inexperienced squire would probably have fared but ill in purse, person, and reputation, but for the protection of Bagot, who walked through all these fiery furnaces like a moral salamander. Bagot, too, had furnished him with many valuable hints for his conduct in his new sphere, and for the management of Bagot, who wanted to put him in good-humor. his property. These merits, added to a sort" "I would be a clever butler that could do "Your 're a sharp fellow, Dubbley," said of jovial, overbearing good-humor of Bagot's, you." always go to the cellar myself. Why, a tippling butler might knock off the head of a "I stick to my old rule," said the squirebottle, and drink it up any time, if he had the keys, colonel; and how should I be the wiser?unless," added the squire, thoughtfully, "unless I was counting the bottles all day long. Why, she said," returned the squire, "that if I did n't pay her double, she 'd summon me, and swear that I had refused her her money out of revenge because she would n't let me make love to her." "Oh!" said Bagot, dryly. "And I told her to go to the devil; but she went to a lawyer "Quite a different course," said Bagot. And, by George," said the squire," she made him believe her story. I'd have kicked against it - yes, I'd have gone to jail first for the jade used to skylark with half the parish, though she 'd have nothing to say to me; but I wanted to keep the thing quiet, and I gave in. Certain people," said the squire, laying his finger on his nose, and winking at Bagot, "might have heard of it." "Certain people?" said Bagot, interrogatively. 66 Ah," said the squire, these things sound queer to ladies. I might have felt ashamed before somebody we know -somebody you and I know," said the squire, looking idiotically wise. "Where did these books come from?" inquired Bagot, pretending not to notice the squire's drift. "You don't mean to say you ever read anything now. What made you get that Life of Napoleon ?" “Ah,” said Mr. Dubbley, "great traveller, Napoleon! Yes, I've begun to read. felt my deficience. I've felt it a good while, but it has come plainer upon me lately. Last time I was in town I gave a bookseller an order to fill my shelves." "Russia! No, d-n it, no, "said the squire, "they were all bound in London, every one of 'em; and I had to come down for 'em handsomely, as you say. You see," said the squire, as they sat down to dinner, one must read to have something to say in ladies' society.. If 't wasn't for that, curse me if I'd ever look at a book." 66 "What are you reading up for?" asked Bagot "the housemaid or the cook? By gad, I expect, Dubbley, to see you marry the scullery-maid yet!" 66 "Eh - what?" said the squire, changing color (for he had much more confidence in Bagot's opinion than his own, even on such a point). No, hang it, don't say that! Scullery-maid! no, by George! nor dairy-maid neither," he muttered. No, no, I thought you knew my mind better than that." 66 "I'll tell you what it is, Dubbley, my boy," said the colonel, laying down his knife and fork, and looking at him, "if you don't mind what you 're at, some sharp woman or other will take you in some pretty servantmaid, whose sense of propriety is proof against a five-pound note. I'd engage to make any good-looking girl in the parish marry you before Christmas, if she'd only follow my instructions." "For God's sake don't talk like that! the thing 's beyond a joke! Come, colonel, you would n't be so unfriendly?" said Mr. Dubbley, pushing away his plate, and rubbing his bald forehead nervously with his napkin, as he thought of the colonel's unbounded resources, all brought to bear upon his unfortunate self. Bagot laughed. "If you're such a confounded spoon that you can't trust yourself, Dubbley," said he, "why don't you put yourself out of harm's way? Why don't you marry some respectable woman that would do you credit and keep you out of scrapes?" the very "The very thing," said Dubbley thing I intend. I've been thinking of it this long while. What d'ye think now of a certain person · -a certain person not very far off? Any chance for me eh?" "The very thing," said the colonel; I" nothing could be better. Handsome, accomplished, rich-what could be better? But there go two words to that bargain. You know that, don't you?" "Who selected your library?" asked Bagot. "Had the gamekeeper anything to do with it?" "I left it to the bookseller," replied Dubbley. "I gave him the size of the shelves to an inch, and you'll find 'em quite full. They 're all bound alike, too." "What-mine and hers, eh?" said the squire, looking wise. "Mine, I fancy, is more important than either," said Bagot gravely. "Why, I know you 've great influence with her, colonel. But, then, I always thought you a friend of mine." "Well," said the colonel," you 're not u |