m not aware
that I meant to tell you anything.'

Mr. Beaves Urmsing turned square-breasted on Fenellan: 'Fellow's a born
donkey!'

'And the mother lived?' said Fenellan.

Mr. Beaves Urmsing puffed with wrath at the fellow.

Five minutes later, in the midst of the group surrounding and
felicitating Victor, he had sight of Fenellan conversing with fair ones,
and it struck a light in him; he went three steps backward, with shouts.
'Dam funny fellow! eh? who is he? I must have that man at my table.
Worth fifty Colonel Jackasses! And I 've got a son in the Guards: and as
much laugh in him, he 's got, as a bladder. But we'll make a party, eh,
Radnor? with that friend o' yours. Dam funny fellow! and precious little
of it going on now among the young lot. They're for seeing ghosts and
gaping their jaws; all for the quavers instead of the capers.'

He sounded and thrummed his roguish fling-off for the capers. A second
glimpse of Fenellan agitated the anecdote, as he called it, seizing
Victor's arm, to have him out of earshot of the ladies. Delivery,
not without its throes, was accomplished, but imperfectly, owing to
sympathetic convulsions, under which Mr. Beaves Urmsing's countenance
was crinkled of many colours, as we see the Spring rhubarb-leaf. Unable
to repeat the brevity of Fenellan's rejoinder, he expatiated on it to
convey it, swearing that it was the kind of thing done in the old days,
when men were witty dogs:--'pat! and pat back! as in the pantomime.'

'Repartee!' said Victor. 'He has it. You shall know him. You're the man
for him.'

'He for me, that he is!--"Hope the mother's doing well? My card":--eh?
Grave as an owl! Look, there goes the donkey, lady to right and left,
all ears for him--ha! ha! I must have another turn with your friend.
"Mother lived, did she?" Dam funny fellow, all of the olden time! And
a dinner, bachelor dinner, six of us, at my place, next week, say
Wednesday, half-past six, for a long evening--flowing bowl--eh, shall it
be?'

Nesta came looking to find her Captain Dartrey.

Mr. Beaves Urmsing grew courtly of the olden time. He spied Colonel
Corfe anew, and 'Donkey!' rose to split the roar at his mouth, and full
of his anecdote, he pursued some congenial acquaintances, crying to his
host: 'Wednesday, mind! eh? by George, your friend's gizzarded me for
the day!'

Plumped with the rich red stream of life, this last of the squires of
old England thumped along among the guests, a very