ere they are to _join_.'

She beckoned, and Hal, who was foremost, and proud to show his alacrity,
ran on to receive her ladyship's orders. Now, as we have before
observed, it was a sharp and windy day; and though Lady Diana
Sweepstakes was actually speaking to him, and looking at him, he could
not prevent his nose from wanting to be blowed. He pulled out his
handkerchief, and out rolled the new ball which had been given to him
just before he left home, and which, according to his usual careless
habits, he had stuffed into his pocket in his hurry.

'Oh, my new ball!' cried he, as he ran after it.

As he stopped to pick it up, he let go his hat, which he had hitherto
held on with anxious care; for the hat, though it had a fine green and
white cockade, had no band or string round it. The string, as we may
recollect, our wasteful hero had used in spinning his top. The hat was
too large for his head without this band; a sudden gust of wind blew it
off. Lady Diana's horse started and reared. She was a _famous_
horsewoman, and sat him to the admiration of all beholders; but there
was a puddle of red clay and water in this spot, and her ladyship's
uniform habit was a sufferer by the accident.

'Careless brat!' said she; 'why can't he keep his hat upon his head?'

In the meantime, the wind blew the hat down the hill, and Hal ran after
it amidst the laughter of his kind friends, the young Sweepstakes, and
the rest of the little regiment. The hat was lodged at length upon a
bank. Hal pursued it; he thought this bank was hard, but, alas! the
moment he set his foot upon it the foot sank. He tried to draw it back;
his other foot slipped, and he fell prostrate, in his green and white
uniform, into the treacherous bed of red mud. His companions, who had
halted upon the top of the hill, stood laughing spectators of his
misfortune.

It happened that the poor boy with the black patch upon his eye, who had
been ordered by Lady Diana to '_fall back_,' and to '_keep at a
distance_,' was now coming up the hill, and the moment he saw our fallen
hero he hastened to his assistance. He dragged poor Hal, who was a
deplorable spectacle, out of the red mud. The obliging mistress of a
lodging-house, as soon as she understood that the young gentleman was
nephew to Mr. Gresham, to whom she had formerly let her house, received
Hal, covered as he was with dirt.

The poor Bristol lad hastened to Mr. Gresham's for clean stockings and
shoes for Hal