baize; but to relieve his
mind he was obliged to get behind his wife, and shrug his shoulders to
Lysimachus and the eldest girl, as who should say _voila bien une femme
votre mere a vous!_

At last he was off, in high spirits. He reached Covent Garden at
half-past ten, and there the poor fellow was sucked into our narrative
whirlpool.

We must, however, leave him for a few minutes.

CHAPTER V.

SIR CHARLES POMANDER was detained in the country much longer than he
expected.

He was rewarded by a little adventure. As he cantered up to London with
two servants and a post-boy, all riding on horses ordered in relays
beforehand, he came up with an antediluvian coach, stuck fast by the
road-side. Looking into the window, with the humane design of quizzing
the elders who should be there, he saw a young lady of surpassing
beauty. This altered the case; Sir Charles instantly drew bridle and
offered his services.

The lady thanked him, and being an innocent country lady, she opened
those sluices, her eyes, and two tears gently trickled down, while she
told him how eager she was to reach London, and how mortified at this
delay.

The good Sir Charles was touched. He leaped his horse over a hedge,
galloped to a farm-house in sight, and returned with ropes and rustics.
These and Sir Charles's horses soon drew the coach out of some stiffish
clay.

The lady thanked him, and thanked him, and thanked him, with heightening
color and beaming eyes, and he rode away like a hero.

Before he had gone five miles he became thoughtful and
self-dissatisfied, finally his remorse came to a head; he called to him
the keenest of his servants, Hunsdon, and ordered him to ride back past
the carriage, then follow and put up at the same inn, to learn who the
lady was, and whither going; and, this knowledge gained, to ride into
town full speed and tell his master all about it. Sir Charles then
resumed his complacency, and cantered into London that same evening.

Arrived there, he set himself in earnest to cut out his friend with Mrs.
Woffington. He had already caused his correspondence with that lady to
grow warm and more tender, by degrees. Keeping a copy of his last, he
always knew where he was. Cupid's barometer rose by rule; and so he
arrived by just gradations at an artful climax, and made her in terms of
chivalrous affection, an offer of a house, etc., three hundred a year,
etc., not forgetting his heart, etc. He knew that the ladies