ts wouldn't stick to me so."

"You talk too much."

"Gad, I don't get puffy half so soon as you."

"I want country air."

"You said you were going out, old Ned."

"I changed my mind."

Saying which, Edward shut his teeth, and talked for two or three hot
minutes wholly with his fists. The room shook under Algernon's boundings
to right and left till a blow sent him back on the breakfast-table,
shattered a cup on the floor, and bespattered his close flannel shirt
with a funereal coffee-tinge.

"What the deuce I said to bring that on myself, I don't know," Algernon
remarked as he rose. "Anything connected with the country disagreeable to
you, Ned? Come! a bout of quiet scientific boxing, and none of these
beastly rushes, as if you were singling me out of a crowd of magsmen. Did
you go to church yesterday, Ned? Confound it, you're on me again, are
you?"

And Algernon went on spouting unintelligible talk under a torrent of
blows. He lost his temper and fought out at them; but as it speedily
became evident to him that the loss laid him open to punishment, he
prudently recovered it, sparred, danced about, and contrived to shake the
room in a manner that caused Edward to drop his arms, in consideration
for the distracted occupant of the chambers below. Algernon accepted the
truce, and made it peace by casting off one glove.

"There! that's a pleasant morning breather," he said, and sauntered to
the window to look at the river. "I always feel the want of it when I
don't get it. I could take a thrashing rather than not on with the gloves
to begin the day. Look at those boats! Fancy my having to go down to the
city. It makes me feel like my blood circulating the wrong way. My
father'll suffer some day, for keeping me at this low ebb of cash, by
jingo!"

He uttered this with a prophetic fierceness.

"I cannot even scrape together enough for entrance money to a Club. It's
sickening! I wonder whether I shall ever get used to banking work?
There's an old clerk in our office who says he should feel ill if he
missed a day. And the old porter beats him--bangs him to fits. I believe
he'd die off if he didn't see the house open to the minute. They say that
old boy's got a pretty niece; but he don't bring her to the office now.
Reward of merit!--Mr. Anthony Hackbut is going to receive ten pounds a
year extra. That's for his honesty. I wonder whether I could earn a
reputation for the sake of a prospect of ten extra pounds to my