o
pieces of toast, with a thick layer of cold ham between them, looked at his
great warming-pan of a watch, and said to his guest, 'When you're (wheeze),
I'm (puff).' So saying he got up, and gave his great legs one or two
convulsive shakes, as if to see that they were on.

Mrs. Jogglebury looked reproachfully at him, as much as to say, 'How _can_
you behave so?'

Mr. Sponge, as he eyed Jog's ill-made, queerly put on garments, wished that
he had not desired Leather to go to the meet. It would have been better to
have got the horses a little way off, and have shirked Jog, who did not
look like a desirable introducer to a hunting field.

'I'll be with you directly,' replied Mr. Sponge, gulping down the remains
of his tea; adding, 'I've just got to run upstairs and get a cigar.' So
saying, he jumped up and disappeared.

Murry Ann, not approving of Sponge's smoking in his bedroom, had hid the
cigar-case under the toilet cover, at the back of the glass, and it was
some time before he found it.

Mrs. Jogglebury availed herself of the lapse of time, and his absence, to
pacify her young Turk, and try to coax him into reciting the marvellous
'Obin and Ichard.'

As Mr. Sponge came clanking downstairs with the cigar-case in his hand, she
met him (accidentally, of course) at the bottom, with the boy in her arms,
and exclaimed, 'O Mr. Sponge, here's Gustavus James wants to tell you a
little story.'

Mr. Sponge stopped--inwardly hoping that it would not be a long one.

'Now, my darling,' said she, sticking the boy up straight to get him to
begin.

'Now, then!' exclaimed Mr. Crowdey, in the true Jehu-like style, from the
vehicle at the door, in which he had composed himself.

'Coming, Jog! coming!' replied Mrs. Crowdey, with a frown on her brow at
the untimely interruption; then appealing again to the child, who was
nestling in his mother's bosom, as if disinclined to show off, she said,
'Now, my darling, let the gentleman hear how nicely you'll say it.'

The child still slunk.

'That's a fine fellow, out with it!' said Mr. Sponge, taking up his hat to
be off.

'Now, then!' exclaimed his host again.

'Coming!' replied Mr. Sponge.

As if to thwart him, the child then began, Mrs. Jogglebury holding up her
forefinger as well in admiration as to keep silence:

'Obin and Ichard, two pretty men,
Lay in bed till 'e clock struck ten;
Up starts Obin, and looks at the sky--'

And then the brat stopped.

'Ver