rs. Guy Flouncey's ball. Imagine the reception, the canopy, the scarlet
cloth, the 'God save the King' from the band of the first guards,
bivouacked in the hall, Mrs. Guy Flouncey herself performing her part
as if she had received princesses of the blood all her life; so reverent
and yet so dignified, so very calm and yet with a sort of winning,
sunny innocence. Her royal highness was quite charmed with her hostess,
praised her much to Lady Kingcastle, told her that she was glad that she
had come, and even stayed half an hour longer than Mrs. Guy Flouncey
had dared to hope. As for the other guests, the peerage was gutted.
The Dictator himself was there, and, the moment her royal highness had
retired, Mrs. Guy Flouncey devoted herself to the hero. All the great
ladies, all the ambassadors, all the beauties, a full chapter of the
Garter, a chorus among the 'best men' that it was without doubt the
'best ball' of the year, happy Mrs. Guy Flouncey! She threw a glance at
her swing-glass while Mr. Guy Flouncey, who 'had not had time to get
anything the whole evening,' was eating some supper on a tray in her
dressing-room at five o'clock in the morning, and said, 'We have done it
at last, my love!'

She was right; and from that moment Mrs. Guy Flouncey was asked to all
the great houses, and became a lady of the most unexceptionable _ton_.

But all this time we are forgetting her _dejeuner_, and that Tancred
is winding his way through the garden lanes of Fulham to reach Craven
Cottage.

CHAPTER XIV.

_The Coningsbys_

THE day was brilliant: music, sunshine, ravishing bonnets, little
parasols that looked like large butterflies. The new phaetons glided
up, then carriages-and-four swept by; in general the bachelors were
ensconced in their comfortable broughams, with their glasses down and
their blinds drawn, to receive the air and to exclude the dust; some
less provident were cavaliers, but, notwithstanding the well-watered
roads, seemed a little dashed as they cast an anxious glance at the
rose which adorned their button-hole, or fancied that they felt a flying
black from a London chimney light upon the tip of their nose.

Within, the winding walks dimly echoed whispering words; the lawn was
studded with dazzling groups; on the terrace by the river a dainty
multitude beheld those celebrated waters which furnish flounders to
Richmond and whitebait to Blackwall.

'Mrs. Coningsby shall decide,' said Lord Beaumanoir