e.

To my surprise, there were TWO ladies in the coach with my friend,
and not ONE, as I had expected. One of these, a stout female, carrying
sundry baskets, bags, umbrellas, and woman's wraps, was evidently a
maid-servant: the other, in black, was Pogson's fair one, evidently.
I could see a gleam of curl-papers over a sallow face,--of a dusky
nightcap flapping over the curl-papers,--but these were hidden by a lace
veil and a huge velvet bonnet, of which the crowning birds-of-paradise
were evidently in a moulting state. She was encased in many shawls
and wrappers; she put, hesitatingly, a pretty little foot out of the
carriage--Pogson was by her side in an instant, and, gallantly putting
one of his white kids round her waist, aided this interesting creature
to descend. I saw, by her walk, that she was five-and-forty, and that my
little Pogson was a lost man.

After some brief parley between them--in which it was charming to hear
how my friend Samuel WOULD speak, what he called French, to a lady
who could not understand one syllable of his jargon--the mutual
hackney-coaches drew up; Madame la Baronne waved to the Captain a
graceful French curtsy. "Adyou!" said Samuel, and waved his lily hand.
"Adyou-addimang."

A brisk little gentleman, who had made the journey in the same coach
with Pogson, but had more modestly taken a seat in the Imperial, here
passed us, and greeted me with a "How d'ye do?" He had shouldered
his own little valise, and was trudging off, scattering a cloud of
commissionaires, who would fain have spared him the trouble.

"Do you know that chap?" says Pogson; "surly fellow, ain't he?"

"The kindest man in existence," answered I; "all the world knows little
Major British."

"He's a Major, is he?--why, that's the fellow that dined with us at
Killyax's; it's lucky I did not call myself Captain before him,
he mightn't have liked it, you know:" and then Sam fell into a
reverie;--what was the subject of his thoughts soon appeared.

"Did you ever SEE such a foot and ankle?" said Sam, after sitting for
some time, regardless of the novelty of the scene, his hands in his
pockets, plunged in the deepest thought.

"ISN'T she a slap-up woman, eh, now?" pursued he; and began enumerating
her attractions, as a horse-jockey would the points of a favorite
animal.

"You seem to have gone a pretty length already," said I, "by promising
to visit her to-morrow."

"A good length?--I believe you. Leave ME alone for