s a sort of volunteer, at
all events an undesired guest, unless his lordship accompanied him. It so
happened that the least wanted guest was the first to arrive on the
all-important day.

Lord Scamperdale, knowing our friend Jack was not over affluent, had no
idea of spoiling him by too much luxury, and as the railway would serve a
certain distance in the line of Hanby House, he despatched Jack to the
Over-shoes-over-boots station with the dog-cart, and told him he would be
sure to find a 'bus, or to get some sort of conveyance at the Squandercash
station to take him up to Puffington's; at all events, his lordship added
to himself, 'If he doesn't, it'll do him no harm to walk, and he can easily
get a boy to carry his bag.'

The latter was the case; for though the station-master assured Jack, on his
arrival at Squandercash, that there was a 'bus, or a mail gig, or a
something to every other train, there was nothing in connexion with the one
that brought him, nor would he undertake to leave his carpet-bag at Hanby
House before breakfast-time the next morning.

[Illustration: JACK PROTESTS AGAINST ALL RAILWAYS]

Jack was highly enraged, and proceeded to squint his eyes inside out, and
abuse all railways, and chairmen, and directors, and secretaries, and
clerks, and porters, vowing that railways were the greatest nuisances under
the sun--that they were a perfect impediment instead of a facility to
travelling--and declared that formerly a gentleman had nothing to do but
order his four horses, and have them turned out at every stage as he came
up, instead of being stopped in the _ridicklous_ manner he then was; and he
strutted and stamped about the station as if he would put a stop to the
whole line. His vehemence and big talk operated favourably on the Cockney
station-master, who, thinking he must be a duke, or some great man, began
to consider how to get him forwarded. It being only a thinly populated
district--though there was a station equal to any mercantile emergency,
indeed to the requirements of the whole county--he ran the resources of the
immediate neighbourhood through his mind, and at length was obliged to
admit--humbly and respectfully--that he really was afraid Martha Muggins's
donkey was the only available article.

Jack fumed and bounced at the very mention of such a thing, vowing that it
was a downright insult to propose it; and he was so bumptious that the
station-master, who had nothing to gain by the t