!

* * * * *

Mr. Seaforth descended that morning, whip in hand, and equipped in a
handsome green riding-frock, but no "breeches and boots to match" were
there: loose jean trousers, surmounting a pair of diminutive
Wellingtons, embraced, somewhat incongruously, his nether man, _vice_
the "patent cords," returned, like yesterday's pantaloons, absent
without leave. The "top-boots" had a holiday.

"A fine morning after the rain," said Mr. Simpkinson from Bath.

"Just the thing for the 'ops," said Mr. Peters. "I remember when I was a
boy----"

"Do hold your tongue, P.," said Mrs. Peters--advice which that exemplary
matron was in the constant habit of administering to "her P." as she
called him, whenever he prepared to vent his reminiscences. Her precise
reason for this it would be difficult to determine, unless, indeed, the
story be true which a little bird had whispered into Mrs. Botherby's
ear--Mr. Peters, though now a wealthy man had received a liberal
education at a charity school, and was apt to recur to the days of his
muffin-cap and leathers. As usual, he took his wife's hint in good part,
and "paused in his reply."

"A glorious day for the ruins!" said young Ingoldsby. "But Charles, what
the deuce are you about? you don't mean to ride through our lanes in
such toggery as that?"

"Lassy me!" said Miss Julia Simpkinson, "won't yo' be very wet?"

"You had better take Tom's cab," quoth the squire.

But this proposition was at once over-ruled; Mrs. Ogleton had already
nailed the cab, a vehicle of all others the best adapted for a snug
flirtation.

"Or drive Miss Julia in the phaeton?" No; that was the post of Mr.
Peters, who, indifferent as an equestrian, had acquired some fame as a
whip while traveling through the midland counties for the firm of
Bagshaw, Snivelby, and Ghrimes.

"Thank you, I shall ride with my cousins," said Charles, with as much
_nonchalance_ as he could assume--and he did so; Mr. Ingoldsby, Mrs.
Peters, Mr. Simpkinson from Bath, and his eldest daughter with her
_album_, following in the family coach. The gentleman-commoner "voted
the affair d----d slow," and declined the party altogether in favor of
the gamekeeper and a cigar. "There was 'no fun' in looking at old
houses!" Mrs. Simpkinson preferred a short _sejour_ in the still-room
with Mrs. Botherby, who had promised to initiate her in that grand
_arcanum_, the transmutation of gooseberry jam into Guava