CHAPTER XXVI

MRS. MEL MAKES A BED FOR HERSELF AND FAMILY

The last person thought of by her children at this period was Mrs. Mel:

nor had she been thinking much of them till a letter from Mr. Goren

arrived one day, which caused her to pass them seriously in review.

Always an early bird, and with maxims of her own on the subject of rising

and getting the worm, she was standing in a small perch in the corner of

the shop, dictating accounts to Mrs. Fiske, who was copying hurriedly,

that she might earn sweet intervals for gossip, when Dandy limped up and

delivered the letter. Mrs. Fiske worked hard while her aunt was occupied

in reading it, for a great deal of fresh talk follows the advent of the

post, and may be reckoned on. Without looking up, however, she could tell

presently that the letter had been read through. Such being the case, and

no conversation coming of it, her curiosity was violent. Her aunt's face,

too, was an index of something extraordinary. That inflexible woman,

instead of alluding to the letter in any way, folded it up, and renewed

her dictation. It became a contest between them which should show her

human nature first. Mrs. Mel had to repress what she knew; Mrs. Fiske to

control the passion for intelligence. The close neighbourhood of one

anxious to receive, and one capable of giving, waxed too much for both.

'I think, Anne, you are stupid this morning,' said Mrs. Mel.

'Well, I am, aunt,' said Mrs. Fiske, pretending not to see which was the

first to unbend, 'I don't know what it is. The figures seem all dazzled

like. I shall really be glad when Evan comes to take his proper place.'

'Ah!' went Mrs. Mel, and Mrs. Fiske heard her muttering. Then she cried

out: 'Are Harriet and Caroline as great liars as Louisa?'

Mrs. Fiske grimaced. 'That would be difficult, would it not, aunt?'

'And I have been telling everybody that my son is in town learning his

business, when he's idling at a country house, and trying to play his

father over again! Upon my word, what with liars and fools, if you go to

sleep a minute you have a month's work on your back.'

'What is it, aunt?' Mrs. Fiske feebly inquired.

'A gentleman, I suppose! He wouldn't take an order if it was offered.

Upon my word, when tailors think of winning heiresses it's time we went

back to Adam and Eve.'

'Do you mean Evan, aunt?' interposed Mrs. Fiske, who probably did not see

the turns in her aunt's mind.

'There--read for yourself,' said Mrs. Mel, and left her with the letter.

Mrs. Fiske read that Mr. Goren had been astonished at Evan's

non-appearance, and at his total silence; which he did not consider

altogether gentlemanly behaviour, and certainly not such as his father

would have practised. Mr. Goren regretted his absence the more as he

would have found him useful in a remarkable invention he was about to

patent, being a peculiar red cross upon shirts--a fortune to the

patentee; but as Mr. Goren had no natural heirs of his body, he did not

care for that. What affected him painfully was the news of Evan's doings

at a noble house, Beckley Court, to wit, where, according to the report

of a rich young gentleman friend, Mr. Raikes (for whose custom Mr. Goren

was bound to thank Evan), the youth who should have been learning the

science of Tailoring, had actually passed himself off as a lord, or the

son of one, or something of the kind, and had got engaged to a wealthy

heiress, and would, no doubt, marry her if not found out. Where the

chances of detection were so numerous, Mr. Goren saw much to condemn in

the idea of such a marriage. But 'like father like son,' said Mr. Goren.

He thanked the Lord that an honest tradesman was not looked down upon in

this country; and, in fact, gave Mrs. Mel a few quiet digs to waken her

remorse in having missed the man that he was.

When Mrs. Fiske met her aunt again she returned her the letter, and

simply remarked: 'Louisa.'

Mrs. Mel nodded. She understood the implication.

The General who had schemed so successfully to gain Evan time at Beckley

Court in his own despite and against a hundred obstructions, had now

another enemy in the field, and one who, if she could not undo her work,

could punish her. By the afternoon coach, Mrs. Mel, accompanied by Dandy

her squire, was journeying to Fallow field, bent upon things. The

faithful squire was kept by her side rather as a security for others than

for, his particular services. Dandy's arms were crossed, and his

countenance was gloomy. He had been promised a holiday that afternoon to

give his mistress, Sally, Kilne's cook, an airing, and Dandy knew in his

soul that Sally, when she once made up her mind to an excursion, would

go, and would not go alone, and that her very force of will endangered

her constancy. He had begged humbly to be allowed to stay, but Mrs. Mel

could not trust him. She ought to have told him so, perhaps. Explanations

were not approved of by this well-intended despot, and however beneficial

her resolves might turn out for all parties, it was natural that in the

interim the children of her rule should revolt, and Dandy, picturing his

Sally flaunting on the arm of some accursed low marine, haply, kicked

against Mrs. Mel's sovereignty, though all that he did was to shoot out

his fist from time to time, and grunt through his set teeth: 'Iron!' to

express the character of her awful rule.

Mrs. Mel alighted at the Dolphin, the landlady of which was a Mrs.

Hawkshaw, a rival of Mrs. Sockley of the Green Dragon. She was welcomed

by Mrs. Hawkshaw with considerable respect. The great Mel had sometimes

slept at the Dolphin.

'Ah, that black!' she sighed, indicating Mrs. Mel's dress and the story

it told.

'I can't give you his room, my dear Mrs. Harrington, wishing I could! I'm

sorry to say it's occupied, for all I ought to be glad, I dare say, for

he's an old gentleman who does you a good turn, if you study him. But

there! I'd rather have had poor dear Mr. Harrington in my best bed than

old or young--Princes or nobodies, I would--he was that grand and

pleasant.'

Mrs. Mel had her tea in Mrs. Hawkshaw's parlour, and was entertained

about her husband up to the hour of supper, when a short step and a

querulous voice were heard in the passage, and an old gentleman appeared

before them.

'Who's to carry up my trunk, ma'am? No man here?'

Mrs. Hawkshaw bustled out and tried to lay her hand on a man. Failing to

find the growth spontaneous, she returned and begged the old gentleman to

wait a few moments and the trunk would be sent up.

'Parcel o' women!' was his reply. 'Regularly bedevilled. Gets worse and

worse. I 'll carry it up myself.'

With a wheezy effort he persuaded the trunk to stand on one end, and then

looked at it. The exertion made him hot, which may account for the rage

he burst into when Mrs. Hawkshaw began flutteringly to apologize.

'You're sure, ma'am, sure--what are you sure of? I'll tell you what I am

sure of--eh? This keeping clear of men's a damned pretence. You don't

impose upon me. Don't believe in your pothouse nunneries--not a bit. Just

like you! when you are virtuous it's deuced inconvenient. Let one of the

maids try? No. Don't believe in 'em.'

Having thus relieved his spleen the old gentleman addressed himself to

further efforts and waxed hotter. He managed to tilt the trunk over, and

thus gained a length, and by this method of progression arrived at the

foot of the stairs, where he halted, and wiped his face, blowing lustily.

Mrs. Mel had been watching him with calm scorn all the while. She saw him

attempt most ridiculously to impel the trunk upwards by a similar

process, and thought it time to interfere.

'Don't you see you must either take it on your shoulders, or have a

help?'

The old gentleman sprang up from his peculiarly tight posture to blaze

round at her. He had the words well-peppered on his mouth, but somehow he

stopped, and was subsequently content to growl: 'Where 's the help in a

parcel of petticoats?'

Mrs. Mel did not consider it necessary to give him an answer. She went up

two or three steps, and took hold of one handle of the trunk, saying:

'There; I think it can be managed this way,' and she pointed for him to

seize the other end with his hand.

He was now in that unpleasant state of prickly heat when testy old

gentlemen could commit slaughter with ecstasy. Had it been the maid

holding a candle who had dared to advise, he would have overturned her

undoubtedly, and established a fresh instance of the impertinence, the

uselessness and weakness of women. Mrs. Mel topped him by half a head,

and in addition stood three steps above him; towering like a giantess.

The extreme gravity of her large face dispersed all idea of an assault.

The old gentleman showed signs of being horribly injured: nevertheless,

he put his hand to the trunk; it was lifted, and the procession ascended

the stairs in silence.

The landlady waited for Mrs. Mel to return, and then said:

'Really, Mrs. Harrington, you are clever. That lifting that trunk's as

good as a lock and bolt on him. You've as good as made him a Dolphin--him

that was one o' the oldest Green Dragons in Fallifield. My thanks to you

most sincere.'

Mrs. Mel sent out to hear where Dandy had got to after which, she said:

'Who is the man?'

'I told you, Mrs. Harrington--the oldest Green Dragon. His name, you

mean? Do you know, if I was to breathe it out, I believe he'd jump out of

the window. He 'd be off, that you might swear to. Oh, such a whimsical!

not ill-meaning--quite the contrary. Study his whims, and you'll never

want. There's Mrs. Sockley--she 's took ill. He won't go there--that 's

how I've caught him, my dear--but he pays her medicine, and she looks to

him the same. He hate a sick house: but he pity a sick woman. Now, if I

can only please him, I can always look on him as half a Dolphin, to say

the least; and perhaps to-morrow I'll tell you who he is, and what, but

not to-night; for there's his supper to get over, and that, they say, can

be as bad as the busting of one of his own vats. Awful!'

'What does he eat?' said Mrs. Mel.

'A pair o' chops. That seem simple, now, don't it? And yet they chops

make my heart go pitty-pat.'

'The commonest things are the worst done,' said Mrs. Mel.

'It ain't that; but they must be done his particular way, do you see,

Mrs. Harrington. Laid close on the fire, he say, so as to keep in the

juice. But he ups and bounces in a minute at a speck o' black. So, one

thing or the other, there you are: no blacks, no juices, I say.'

'Toast the chops,' said Mrs. Mel.

The landlady of the Dolphin accepted this new idea with much

enlightenment, but ruefully declared that she was afraid to go against

his precise instructions. Mrs. Mel then folded her hands, and sat in

quiet reserve. She was one of those numerous women who always know

themselves to be right. She was also one of those very few whom

Providence favours by confounding dissentients. She was positive the

chops would be ill-cooked: but what could she do? She was not in command

here; so she waited serenely for the certain disasters to enthrone her.

Not that the matter of the chops occupied her mind particularly: nor

could she dream that the pair in question were destined to form a part of

her history, and divert the channel of her fortunes. Her thoughts were

about her own immediate work; and when the landlady rushed in with the

chops under a cover, and said: 'Look at 'em, dear Mrs. Harrington!' she

had forgotten that she was again to be proved right by the turn of

events.

'Oh, the chops!' she responded. 'Send them while they are hot.'

'Send 'em! Why you don't think I'd have risked their cooling? I have sent

'em; and what do he do but send 'em travelling back, and here they be;

and what objections his is I might study till I was blind, and I

shouldn't see 'em.'

'No; I suppose not,' said Mrs. Mel. 'He won't eat 'em?'

'Won't eat anything: but his bed-room candle immediately. And whether his

sheets are aired. And Mary says he sniffed at the chops; and that gal

really did expect he 'd fling them at her. I told you what he was. Oh,

dear!'

The bell was heard ringing in the midst of the landlady's lamentations.

'Go to him yourself,' said Mrs. Mel. 'No Christian man should go to sleep

without his supper.'

'Ah! but he ain't a common Christian,' returned Mrs. Hawkshaw.

The old gentleman was in a hurry to know when his bed-room candle was

coming up, or whether they intended to give him one at all that night; if

not, let them say so, as he liked plain-speaking. The moment Mrs.

Hawkshaw touched upon the chops, he stopped her mouth.

'Go about your business, ma'am. You can't cook 'em. I never expected you

could: I was a fool to try you. It requires at least ten years'

instruction before a man can get a woman to cook his chop as he likes

it.'

'But what was your complaint, sir?' said Mrs. Hawkshaw, imploringly.

'That's right!' and he rubbed his hands, and brightened his eyes

savagely. 'That's the way. Opportunity for gossip! Thing's well

done--down it goes: you know that. You can't have a word over it--eh?

Thing's done fit to toss on a dungheap, aha! Then there's a cackle! My

belief is, you do it on purpose. Can't be such rank idiots. You do it on

purpose. All done for gossip!'

'Oh, sir, no!' The landlady half curtsied.

'Oh, ma'am, yes!' The old gentleman bobbed his head.

'No, indeed, sir!' The landlady shook hers.

'Damn it, ma'am, I swear you do.'

Symptoms of wrath here accompanied the declaration; and, with a sigh and

a very bitter feeling, Mrs. Hawkshaw allowed him to have the last word.

Apparently this--which I must beg to call the lady's morsel--comforted

his irascible system somewhat; for he remained in a state of composure

eight minutes by the clock. And mark how little things hang together.

Another word from the landlady, precipitating a retort from him, and a

gesture or muttering from her; and from him a snapping outburst, and from

her a sign that she held out still; in fact, had she chosen to battle for

that last word, as in other cases she might have done, then would he have

exploded, gone to bed in the dark, and insisted upon sleeping: the

consequence of which would have been to change this history. Now while

Mrs. Hawkshaw was upstairs, Mrs. Mel called the servant, who took her to

the kitchen, where she saw a prime loin of mutton; off which she cut two

chops with a cunning hand: and these she toasted at a gradual distance,

putting a plate beneath them, and a tin behind, and hanging the chops so

that they would turn without having to be pierced. The bell rang twice

before she could say the chops were ready. The first time, the maid had

to tell the old gentleman she was taking up his water. Her next excuse

was, that she had dropped her candle. The chops ready--who was to take

them?

'Really, Mrs. Harrington, you are so clever, you ought, if I might be so

bold as say so; you ought to end it yourself,' said the landlady. 'I

can't ask him to eat them: he was all but on the busting point when I

left him.'

'And that there candle did for him quite,' said Mary, the maid.

'I'm afraid it's chops cooked for nothing,' added the landlady.

Mrs. Mel saw them endangered. The maid held back: the landlady feared.

'We can but try,' she said.

'Oh! I wish, mum, you'd face him, 'stead o' me,' said Mary; 'I do dread

that old bear's den.'

'Here, I will go,' said Mrs. Mel. 'Has he got his ale? Better draw it

fresh, if he drinks any.'

And upstairs she marched, the landlady remaining below to listen for the

commencement of the disturbance. An utterance of something certainly

followed Mrs. Mel's entrance into the old bear's den. Then silence. Then

what might have been question and answer. Then--was Mrs. Mel assaulted?

and which was knocked down? It really was a chair being moved to the

table. The door opened.

'Yes, ma'am; do what you like,' the landlady heard. Mrs. Mel descended,

saying: 'Send him up some fresh ale.'

'And you have made him sit down obedient to those chops?' cried the

landlady. 'Well might poor dear Mr. Harrington--pleasant man as he

was!--say, as he used to say, "There's lovely women in the world, Mrs.

Hawkshaw," he'd say, "and there's Duchesses," he'd say, "and there's they

that can sing, and can dance, and some," he says, "that can cook." But

he'd look sly as he'd stoop his head and shake it. "Roll 'em into one,"

he says, "and not any of your grand ladies can match my wife at home."

And, indeed, Mrs. Harrington, he told me he thought so many a time in the

great company he frequented.'

Perfect peace reigning above, Mrs. Hawkshaw and Mrs. Mel sat down to

supper below; and Mrs. Hawkshaw talked much of the great one gone. His

relict did not care to converse about the dead, save in their practical

aspect as ghosts; but she listened, and that passed the time. By-and-by,

the old gentleman rang, and sent a civil message to know if the landlady

had ship's rum in the house.

'Dear! here's another trouble,' cried the poor woman. 'No--none!'

'Say, yes,' said Mrs. Mel, and called Dandy, and charged him to run down

the street to the square, and ask for the house of Mr. Coxwell, the

maltster, and beg of him, in her name, a bottle of his ship's rum.

'And don't you tumble down and break the bottle, Dandy. Accidents with

spirit-bottles are not excused.'

Dandy went on the errand, after an energetic grunt.

In due time he returned with the bottle, whole and sound, and Mr.

Coxwell's compliments. Mrs. Mel examined the cork to see that no process

of suction had been attempted, and then said:

'Carry it up to him, Dandy. Let him see there's a man in the house

besides himself.'

'Why, my dear,' the landlady turned to her, 'it seems natural to you to

be mistress where you go. I don't at all mind, for ain't it my profit?

But you do take us off our legs.'

Then the landlady, warmed by gratitude, told her that the old gentleman

was the great London brewer, who brewed there with his brother, and

brewed for himself five miles out of Fallow field, half of which and a

good part of the neighbourhood he owned, and his name was Mr. Tom

Cogglesby.

'Oh!' said Mrs. Mel. 'And his brother is Mr. Andrew.'

'That 's it,' said the landlady. 'And because he took it into his head to

go and to choose for himself, and be married, no getting his brother, Mr.

Tom, to speak to him. Why not, indeed? If there's to be no marrying, the

sooner we lay down and give up, the better, I think. But that 's his way.

He do hate us women, Mrs. Harrington. I have heard he was crossed. Some

say it was the lady of Beckley Court, who was a Beauty, when he was only

a poor cobbler's son.'

Mrs. Mel breathed nothing of her relationship to Mr. Tom, but continued

from time to time to express solicitude about Dandy. They heard the door

open, and old Tom laughing in a capital good temper, and then Dandy came

down, evidently full of ship's rum.

'He's pumped me!' said Dandy, nodding heavily at his mistress.

Mrs. Mel took him up to his bed-room, and locked the door. On her way

back she passed old Tom's chamber, and his chuckles were audible to her.

'They finished the rum,' said Mrs. Hawkshaw.

'I shall rate him for that to-morrow,' said Mrs. Mel. 'Giving that poor

beast liquor!'

'Rate Mr. Tom! Oh! Mrs. Harrington! Why, he'll snap your head off for a

word.'

Mrs. Mel replied that her head would require a great deal of snapping to

come off.

During this conversation they had both heard a singular intermittent

noise above. Mrs. Hawkshaw was the first to ask:

'What can it be? More trouble with him? He's in his bed-room now.'

'Mad with drink, like Dandy, perhaps,' said Mrs. Mel.

'Hark!' cried the landlady. 'Oh!'

It seemed that Old Tom was bouncing about in an extraordinary manner. Now

came a pause, as if he had sworn to take his rest: now the room shook and

the windows rattled.

'One 'd think, really, his bed was a frying-pan, and him a live fish in

it,' said the landlady. 'Oh--there, again! My goodness! have he got a

flea?'

The thought was alarming. Mrs. Mel joined in:

'Or a ------'

'Don't! don't, my dear!' she was cut short. 'Oh! one o' them little

things 'd be ruin to me. To think o' that! Hark at him! It must be. And

what's to do? I 've sent the maids to bed. We haven't a man. If I was to

go and knock at his door, and ask?'

'Better try and get him to be quiet somehow.'

'Ah! I dare say I shall make him fire out fifty times worse.'

Mrs. Hawkshaw stipulated that Mrs. Mel should stand by her, and the two

women went up-stairs and stood at Old Tom's door. There they could hear

him fuming and muttering imprecations, and anon there was an interval of

silence, and then the room was shaken, and the cursings recommenced.

'It must be a fight he 's having with a flea,' said the landlady. 'Oh!

pray heaven, it is a flea. For a flea, my dear-gentlemen may bring that

theirselves; but a b-----, that's a stationary, and born of a bed. Don't

you hear? The other thing 'd give him a minute's rest; but a flea's

hop-hop-off and on. And he sound like an old gentleman worried by a flea.

What are you doing?'

Mrs. Mel had knocked at the door. The landlady waited breathlessly for

the result. It appeared to have quieted Old Tom.

'What's the matter?' said Mrs. Mel, severely.

The landlady implored her to speak him fair, and reflect on the desperate

things he might attempt.

'What's the matter? Can anything be done for you?'

Mr. Tom Cogglesby's reply comprised an insinuation so infamous regarding

women when they have a solitary man in their power, that it cannot be

placed on record.

'Is anything the matter with your bed?'

'Anything? Yes; anything is the matter, ma'am. Hope twenty live geese

inside it's enough-eh? Bed, do you call it? It's the rack! It's

damnation! Bed? Ha!'

After delivering this, he was heard stamping up and down the room.

'My very best bed!' whispered the landlady. 'Would it please you, sir, to

change--I can give you another?'

'I'm not a man of experiments, ma'am-'specially in strange houses.'

'So very, very sorry!'

'What the deuce!' Old Tom came close to the door. 'You whimpering! You

put a man in a beast of a bed--you drive him half mad--and then begin to

blubber! Go away.'

'I am so sorry, sir!'

'If you don't go away, ma'am, I shall think your intentions are

improper.'

'Oh, my goodness!' cried poor Mrs. Hawkshaw. 'What can one do with him?'

Mrs. Mel put Mrs. Hawkshaw behind her.

'Are you dressed?' she called out.

In this way Mrs. Mel tackled Old Tom. He was told that should he consent

to cover himself decently, she would come into his room and make his bed

comfortable. And in a voice that dispersed armies of innuendoes, she bade

him take his choice, either to rest quiet or do her bidding. Had Old Tom

found his master at last, and in one of the hated sex? Breathlessly Mrs.

Hawkshaw waited his answer, and she was an astonished woman when it came.

'Very well, ma'am. Wait a couple of minutes. Do as you like.'

On their admission to the interior of the chamber, Old Tom was exhibited

in his daily garb, sufficiently subdued to be civil and explain the cause

of his discomfort. Lumps in his bed: he was bruised by them. He supposed

he couldn't ask women to judge for themselves--they'd be shrieking--but

he could assure them he was blue all down his back. Mrs. Mel and Mrs.

Hawkshaw turned the bed about, and punched it, and rolled it.

'Ha!' went Old Tom, 'what's the good of that? That's just how I found it.

Moment I got into bed geese began to put up their backs.'

Mrs. Mel seldom indulged in a joke, and then only when it had a

proverbial cast. On the present occasion, the truth struck her forcibly,

and she said:

'One fool makes many, and so, no doubt, does one goose.'

Accompanied by a smile the words would have seemed impudent; but spoken

as a plain fact, and with a grave face, it set Old Tom blinking like a

small boy ten minutes after the whip.

'Now,' she pursued, speaking to him as to an old child, 'look here. This

is how you manage. Knead down in the middle of the bed. Then jump into

the hollow. Lie there, and you needn't wake till morning.'

Old Tom came to the side of the bed. He had prepared himself for a

wretched night, an uproar, and eternal complaints against the house, its

inhabitants, and its foundations; but a woman stood there who as much as

told him that digging his fist into the flock and jumping into the

hole--into that hole under his, eyes--was all that was wanted! that he

had been making a noise for nothing, and because he had not the wit to

hit on a simple contrivance! Then, too, his jest about the geese--this

woman had put a stop to that! He inspected the hollow cynically. A man

might instruct him on a point or two: Old Tom was not going to admit that

a woman could.

'Oh, very well; thank you, ma'am; that's your idea. I'll try it. Good

night.'

'Good night,' returned Mrs. Mel. 'Don't forget to jump into the middle.'

'Head foremost, ma'am?'

'As you weigh,' said Mrs. Mel, and Old Tom trumped his lips, silenced if

not beaten. Beaten, one might almost say, for nothing more was heard of

him that night.

He presented himself to Mrs. Mel after breakfast next morning.

'Slept well, ma'am.'

'Oh! then you did as I directed you,' said Mrs. Mel.

'Those chops, too, very good. I got through 'em.'

'Eating, like scratching, only wants a beginning,' said Mrs. Mel.

'Ha! you've got your word, then, as well as everybody else. Where's your

Dandy this morning, ma'am?'

'Locked up. You ought to be ashamed to give that poor beast liquor. He

won't get fresh air to-day.'

'Ha! May I ask you where you're going to-day, ma'am?'

'I am going to Beckley.'

'So am I, ma'am. What d' ye say, if we join company. Care for

insinuations?'

'I want a conveyance of some sort,' returned Mrs. Mel.

'Object to a donkey, ma'am?'

'Not if he's strong and will go.'

'Good,' said Old Tom; and while he spoke a donkey-cart stopped in front

of the Dolphin, and a well-dressed man touched his hat.

'Get out of that damned bad habit, will you?' growled Old Tom. What do

you mean by wearing out the brim o' your hat in that way? Help this woman

in.'

Mrs. Mel helped herself to a part of the seat.

'We are too much for the donkey,' she said.

'Ha, that's right. What I have, ma'am, is good. I can't pretend to

horses, but my donkey's the best. Are you going to cry about him?'

'No. When he's tired I shall either walk or harness you,' said Mrs. Mel.

This was spoken half-way down the High Street of Fallow field. Old Tom

looked full in her face, and bawled out:

'Deuce take it. Are you a woman?'

'I have borne three girls and one boy,' said Mrs. Mel.

'What sort of a husband?'

'He is dead.'

'Ha! that's an opening, but 'tain't an answer. I'm off to Beckley on a

marriage business. I 'm the son of a cobbler, so I go in a donkey-cart.

No damned pretences for me. I'm going to marry off a young tailor to a

gal he's been playing the lord to. If she cares for him she'll take him:

if not, they're all the luckier, both of 'em.'

'What's the tailor's name?' said Mrs. Mel.

'You are a woman,' returned Old Tom. 'Now, come, ma'am, don't you feel

ashamed of being in a donkeycart?'

'I 'm ashamed of men, sometimes,' said Mrs. Mel; 'never of animals.'

''Shamed o' me, perhaps.'

'I don't know you.'

'Ha! well! I'm a man with no pretences. Do you like 'em? How have you

brought up your three girls and one boy? No pretences--eh?'

Mrs. Mel did not answer, and Old Tom jogged the reins and chuckled, and

asked his donkey if he wanted to be a racer.

'Should you take me for a gentleman, ma'am?'

'I dare say you are, sir, at heart. Not from your manner of speech.'

'I mean appearances, ma'am.'

'I judge by the disposition.'

'You do, ma'am? Then, deuce take it, if you are a woman, you 're -----'

Old Tom had no time to conclude.

A great noise of wheels, and a horn blown, caused them both to turn their

heads, and they beheld a curricle descending upon them vehemently, and a

fashionably attired young gentleman straining with all his might at the

reins. The next instant they were rolling on the bank. About twenty yards

ahead the curricle was halted and turned about to see the extent of the

mischief done.

'Pardon, a thousand times, my worthy couple,' cried the sonorous Mr.

Raikes. 'What we have seen we swear not to divulge. Franco and Fred--your

pledge!'

'We swear!' exclaimed this couple.

But suddenly the cheeks of Mr. John Raikes flushed. He alighted from the

box, and rushing up to Old Tom, was shouting, 'My bene--'

'Do you want my toe on your plate?' Old Tom stopped him with.

The mysterious words completely changed the aspect of Mr. John Raikes. He

bowed obsequiously and made his friend Franco step down and assist in the

task of reestablishing the donkey, who fortunately had received no

damage.