ought tears to my eyes, my strength came with them.

"Then I care not," I replied; "I only to live to reward you."

"Mr. Manners shall answer for it to me!" cried John Paul again, and made
a pace toward the door.

"Not so fast, not so fast, captain, or admiral, or whatever you are,"
said the bailiff, stepping in his way, for he was used to such scenes;
"as God reigns, the owners of all these fierce titles be fire-eaters, who
would spit you if you spilt snuff upon 'em. Come, come, gentlemen, your
swords, and we shall see the sights o' London."

This was the signal for another uproar, the tailor shrieking that John
Paul must take off the suit, and Banks the livery; asking the man in the
corner by the sea-chests (who proved to be the landlord) who was to pay
him for his work and his lost cloth. And the landlord shook his fist at
us and shouted back, who was to pay him his four pounds odd, which
included two ten-shilling dinners and a flask of his best wine? The
other tradesmen seized what was theirs and made off with remarks
appropriate to the occasion. And when John Paul and my man were divested
of their plumes, we were marched downstairs and out through a jeering
line of people to a hackney coach.

"Now, sirs, whereaway?" said the bailiff when we were got in beside one
of his men, and burning with the shame of it; "to the prison? Or I has a
very pleasant hotel for gentlemen in Castle Yard."

The frightful stories my dear grandfather had told me of the Fleet came
flooding into my head, and I shuddered and turned sick. I glanced at
John Paul.

"A guinea will not go far in a sponging-house," said he, and the
bailiff's man laughed.

The bailiff gave a direction we did not hear, and we drove off.
He proved a bluff fellow with a bloat yet not unkindly humour, and
despite his calling seemed to have something that was human in him.
He passed many a joke on that pitiful journey in an attempt to break our
despondency, urging us not to be downcast, and reminding us that the last
gentleman he had taken from Pall Mall was in over a thousand pounds, and
that our amount was a bagatelle. And when we had gone through Temple
Bar, instead of keeping on down Fleet Street, we jolted into Chancery
Lane. This roused me.

"My friend has warned you that he has no money," I said, "and no more
have I."

The bailiff regarded me shrewdly.

"Ay," he replied, "I know. But I has seen many stripes o' men in my
time, my masters, and I know