d having sealed the note, directed it to Mr.
Harris at the King's Arms. The cart, the note, and the assistant waiters
departed on their way to Newcome. Florac bade me go to rest with a clear
conscience. In truth, the warning was better given in that way than any
other, and a word from Florac was more likely to be effectual than an
expostulation from me. I had never thought of making it, perhaps; except
at the expressed desire of a lady whose counsel in all the difficult
circumstances of life I own I am disposed to take.

Mr. Jenkins's horse no doubt trotted at a very brisk pace, as
gentlemen's horses will of a frosty night, after their masters have
been regaled with plentiful supplies of wine and ale. I remember in my
bachelor days that my horses always trotted quicker after I had had a
good dinner; the champagne used to communicate itself to them somehow,
and the claret get into their heels. Before midnight the letter for Mr.
Harris was in Mr. Harris's hands in the King's Arms.

It has been said that in the Boscawen Room at the Arms, some of the
jolly fellows of Newcome had a club, of which Parrot the auctioneer, Tom
Potts the talented reporter, now editor of the Independent, Vidler the
apothecary, and other gentlemen, were members.

When we first had occasion to mention that society, it was at an early
stage of this history, long before Clive Newcome's fine moustache had
grown. If Vidler the apothecary was old and infirm then, he is near ten
years older now; he has had various assistants, of course, and one of
them of late years had his become his partner, though the firm continues
to be known by Viller's ancient and respectable name. A jovial fellow
was this partner--a capital convivial member of the Jolly Britons, where
he used to sit very late, so as to be in readiness for any night-work
that might come in.

So the Britons were all sitting, smoking, drinking, and making merry, in
the Boscawen Room, when Jenkins enters with a note, which he straightway
delivers to Mr. Vidler's partner. "From Rosebury? The Princess ill
again, I suppose," says the surgeon, not sorry to let the company know
that he attends her. "I wish the old girl would be ill in the daytime.
Confound it," says he, "what's this----" and he reads out, "'Sir Newcome
est de retour. Bon voyage, mon ami.--F.' What does this mean?"

"I thought you knew French, Jack Harris," says Tom Potts; "you're always
bothering us with your French songs."

"Of cour