a black misshapen lump. "You would not call
this real coal?"

"I 'd not call it Swansea nor Cardiff, Colonel, any more than I 'd say
the claret we had after dinner to-day was 'Mouton;' but still I'd call
each of them very good in their way."

"I return you my thanks, sir, in the name of my wine-merchant. But to
come to the coal question--what could you do with this?"

"What could I do with it? Scores of things--if I had only enough of it.
Burn it in grates--cook with it--smelt metals with it--burn lime with
it--drive engines, not locomotives, but stationaries, with it. I tell
you what, Colonel Bramleigh," said he, with the air of a man who was
asserting what he would not suffer to be gainsaid. "It's coal quite
enough to start a company on; coal within the meaning of the act, as the
lawyers would say."

"You appear to have rather loose notions of joint-stock enterprises, Mr.
Cutbill," said Bramleigh, haughtily.

"I must say, Colonel, they do not invariably inspire me with sentiments
of absolute veneration."

"I hope, however, you feel, sir, that in any enterprise--in any
undertaking--where my name is to stand forth, either as promoter or
abetter, that the world is to see in such guarantee the assurance of
solvency and stability."

"That is precisely what made me think of you; precisely what led me to
say to Culduff, 'Bramleigh is the man to carry the scheme out.'"

Now the familiarity that spoke of Culduff thus unceremoniously in great
part reconciled Bramleigh to hear his own name treated in like fashion,
all the more that it was in a quotation; but still he winced under
the cool impertinence of the man, and grieved to think how far his own
priceless wine had contributed towards it. The Colonel therefore merely
bowed his acknowledgment and was silent.

"I'll be frank with you," said Cutbill, emptying the last of the
decanter into his glass as he spoke. "I 'll be frank with you. We 've
got coal; whether it be much or little, there it is. As to quality, as
I said before, it is n't Cardiff. It won't set the Thames on fire, any
more than the noble lord that owns it; but coal it is, and it will burn
as coal--and yield gas as coal--and make coke as coal, and who wants
more? As to working it himself, Culduff might just as soon pretend he 'd
pay the National Debt. He is over head and ears already; he has been in
bondage with the children of Israel this many a day, and if he was n't
a peer he could not show; but that'