his party, who joined us on the lawn:
and Jeames the footman came forward and helped Mr. Preston out of the
water.

"Oh, you old sinner!" says my Lord, as his brother-in-law came up the
slope. "Will that heart of yours be always so susceptible, you romantic,
apoplectic, immoral man?"

Mr. Preston went away, looking blue with rage, and ill-treated his wife
for a whole month afterwards.

"At any rate," says my Lord, "Titmarsh here has got a place through our
friend's unhappy attachment; and Mrs. Titmarsh has only laughed at him,
so there is no harm there. It's an ill wind that blows nobody good, you
know."

"Such a wind as that, my Lord, with due respect to you, shall never do
good to me. I have learned in the past few years what it is to make
friends with the mammon of unrighteousness; and that out of such
friendship no good comes in the end to honest men. It shall never be
said that Sam Titmarsh got a place because a great man was in love with
his wife; and were the situation ten times as valuable, I should blush
every day I entered the office-doors in thinking of the base means by
which my fortune was made. You have made me free, my Lord; and, thank
God! I am willing to work. I can easily get a clerkship with the
assistance of my friends; and with that and my wife's income, we can
manage honestly to face the world."

This rather long speech I made with some animation; for, look you, I was
not over well pleased that his Lordship should think me capable of
speculating in any way on my wife's beauty.

My Lord at first turned red, and looked rather angry; but at last he held
out his hand and said, "You are right, Titmarsh, and I am wrong; and let
me tell you in confidence, that I think you are a very honest fellow. You
shan't lose by your honesty, I promise you."

Nor did I: for I am at this present moment Lord Tiptoff's steward and
right-hand man: and am I not a happy father? and is not my wife loved and
respected by all the country? and is not Gus Hoskins my brother-in-law,
partner with his excellent father in the leather way, and the delight of
all his nephews and nieces for his tricks and fun?

As for Mr. Brough, that gentleman's history would fill a volume of
itself. Since he vanished from the London world, he has become
celebrated on the Continent, where he has acted a thousand parts, and met
all sorts of changes of high and low fortune. One thing we may at least
admire in the man, and that is, hi