identical Julia Sedley aforesaid, and
entering the bet in it--"done! If I'm not asked to walk in the Close at
noon and look out for a pink bonnet and a black lace cloak, and to
loiter up the market-place till I come across a black hat and blue
muslin dress; if I'm not requested to call at No. 20, and to grant an
interview at No. 84; if I'm not written to by Agatha A. with hazel, and
Belinda B. with black, eyes--all coming after me like flies after a
sugar-cask, why you shall have your ten guineas, my boy, and my colt
into the bargain. Come, write out the advertisement, Tom--I can't, it's
too much trouble; draw it mild, that's all, or the letters we shall get
will necessitate an additional Norwich postman. By George, what fun it
will be to do the girls! Cut along, Tom, can't you?"

"All right," said Gower, pushing away his coffee-cup, and drawing the
ink to him. "Head it 'MARRIAGE,' of course?"

"Of course. That word's as attractive to a woman as the belt to a
prize-fighter, or a pipe of port to a college fellow."

"'MARRIAGE.--A Bachelor----'"

"Tell 'em a military man; all girls have the scarlet fever."

"Very well--'an Officer in the Queen's, of considerable personal
attractions----'"

"My dear fellow, pray don't!" expostulated Belle, in extreme alarm; "we
shall have such swarms of 'em!"

"No, no! we must say that," persisted Gower--"'personal attractions,
aged eight-and-twenty----'"

"Can't you put it, 'in the flower of his age,' or his 'sixth lustre'?
It's so much more poetic."

"'--the flower of his age,' then (that'll leave 'em a wide range from
twenty to fifty, according to their taste), 'is desirous of meeting a
young lady of beauty, talent, and good family,'--eh?"

"Yes. All women think themselves beauties, if they're as ugly as sin.
Milliners and confectioner girls talk Anglo-French, and rattle a
tin-kettle piano after a fashion, and anybody buys a 'family' for
half-a-crown at the Heralds' Office--so fire away."

"'--who, feeling as he does the want of a kindred heart and sympathetic
soul, will accord him the favor of a letter or an interview, as a
preliminary to the greatest step in life.'"

"A step--like one on thin ice--very sure to bring a man to grief,"
interpolated Belle. "Say something about property; those soul-and-spirit
young ladies generally keep a look-out for tin, and only feel an
elective affinity for a lot of debentures and consols."

"'The advertiser being a man of some present