ood boy, and he has promised me to do such a lot of law, and I will see
that he does too. And you know it is so very steadying to young men,
everybody admits that; though, of course, I know I have no money, Mr.
Bloomfield," she added.

"My dear young lady, as this rapscallion told you to-day on the boat,
Uncle Ned has plenty," said the Squirradical, "and I can never forget
that you have been shamefully defrauded. So as there's nobody looking,
you had better give your Uncle Ned a kiss. There, you rogue," resumed
Mr. Bloomfield, when the ceremony had been daintily performed, "this
very pretty young lady is yours, and a vast deal more than you deserve.
But now, let us get back to the houseboat, get up steam on the launch,
and away back to town."

"That's the thing!" cried Gideon; "and to-morrow there will be no
houseboat, and no Jimson, and no carrier's cart, and no piano; and when
Harker awakes on the ditch-side, he may tell himself the whole affair
has been a dream."

"Aha!" said Uncle Ned, "but there's another man who will have a
different awakening. That fellow in the cart will find he has been too
clever by half."

"Uncle Ned and Julia," said Gideon, "I am as happy as the King of
Tartary, my heart is like a threepenny-bit, my heels are like feathers;
I am out of all my troubles, Julia's hand is in mine. Is this a time for
anything but handsome sentiments? Why, there's not room in me for
anything that's not angelic! And when I think of that poor unhappy devil
in the cart, I stand here in the night and cry with a single heart--God
help him!"

"Amen," said Uncle Ned.

CHAPTER XIII

THE TRIBULATIONS OF MORRIS: PART THE SECOND

In a really polite age of literature I would have scorned to cast my eye
again on the contortions of Morris. But the study is in the spirit of
the day; it presents, besides, features of a high, almost a repulsive,
morality; and if it should prove the means of preventing any respectable
and inexperienced gentleman from plunging light-heartedly into crime,
even political crime, this work will not have been penned in vain.

He rose on the morrow of his night with Michael, rose from the leaden
slumber of distress, to find his hand tremulous, his eyes closed with
rheum, his throat parched, and his digestion obviously paralysed. "Lord
knows it's not from eating!" Morris thought; and as he dressed he
reconsidered his position under several heads. Nothing will so well
depict the troubled