t upon my hands."

"Oh! of course--I understand," said I. Meanwhile I could not help
running over in my mind the pleasant possibilities such an adventure
presented, heartily wishing that Curzon had been content to marry by bans
or any other of the legitimate modes in use, without risking his friend's
bones. The other pros and cons of the matter, with full and accurate
directions as to the road to be taken on obtaining possession of the
lady, being all arranged, we parted, I to settle my costume and
appearance for my first performance in an old man's part, and Curzon to
obtain a short leave for a few days from the commanding officer of the
regiment.

When we again met, which was at the mess-table, it was not without
evidence on either side of that peculiar consciousness which persons feel
who have, or think they have, some secret in common, which the world wots
not of. Curzon's unusually quick and excited manner would at once have
struck any close observer as indicating the eve of some important step,
no less than continual allusions to whatever was going on, by sly and
equivocal jokes and ambiguous jests. Happily, however, on the present
occasion, the party were otherwise occupied than watching him--being most
profoundly and learnedly engaged in discussing medicine and matters
medical with all the acute and accurate knowledge which characterises
such discussions among the non-medical public.

The present conversation originated from some mention our senior surgeon
Fitzgerald had just made of a consultation which he was invited to attend
on the next morning, at the distance of twenty miles, and which
necessitated him to start at a most uncomfortably early hour. While he
continued to deplore the hard fate of such men as himself, so eagerly
sought after by the world, that their own hours were eternally broken in
upon by external claims, the juniors were not sparing of their mirth on
the occasion, at the expense of the worthy doctor, who, in plain truth,
had never been disturbed by a request like the present within any one's
memory. Some asserted that the whole thing was a puff, got up by Fitz.
himself, who was only going to have a day's partridge-shooting; others
hinting that it was a blind to escape the vigilance of Mrs. Fitzgerald
--a well-known virago in the regiment--while Fitz. enjoyed himself; and
a third party, pretending to sympathise with the doctor, suggested that
a hundred pounds would be the least he co