d, and was deep in the
good graces of Madame Fribsby, his landlady; and of the whole town,
indeed. The Captain was splendid in person and raiment; fresh-coloured,
blue-eyed, black-whiskered, broad-chested, athletic--a slight tendency
to fulness did not take away from the comeliness of his jolly figure--a
braver soldier never presented a broader chest to the enemy. As he
strode down Clavering High Street, his hat on one side, his cane
clanking on the pavement, or waving round him in the execution of
military cuts and soldatesque manoeuvres--his jolly laughter ringing
through the otherwise silent street--he was as welcome as sunshine to
the place, and a comfort to every inhabitant in it.

On the first market-day he knew every pretty girl in the market: he
joked with all the women: had a word with the farmers about their stock,
and dined at the Agricultural Ordinary at the Clavering Arms, where he
set them all dying with laughing by his fun and jokes. "Tu be sure he be
a vine veller, tu be sure that he be," was the universal opinion of the
gentlemen in top-boots. He shook hands with a score of them, as they
rode out of the inn-yard on their old nags, waving his hat to them
splendidly as he smoked his cigar in the inn-gate. In the course of the
evening he was free of the landlady's bar, knew what rent the landlord
paid, how many acres he farmed, how much malt he put in his strong
beer; and whether he ever ran in a little brandy unexcised by kings from
Baymouth, or the fishing villages along the coast.

He had tried to live at the great house first; but it was so dull he
couldn't stand it. "I am a creature born for society," he told Captain
Glanders. "I'm down here to see Clavering's house set in order; for
between ourselves, Frank has no energy, sir, no energy; he's not the
chest for it, sir (and he threw out his own trunk as he spoke); but I
must have social intercourse. Old Mrs. Blenkinsop goes to bed at seven,
and takes Polly with her. There was nobody but me and the Ghost for the
first two nights at the great house, and I own it, sir, I like company.
Most old soldiers do."

Glanders asked Strong where he had served? Captain Strong curled his
mustache, and said with a laugh, that the other might almost ask where
he had not served. "I began, sir, as cadet of Hungarian Uhlans, and
when the war of Greek independence broke out, quitted that service in
consequence of a quarrel with my governor, and was one of seven
who esc