ghted to meet him. Don't they say he is sweet on a certain
young woman?"

"A dozen, I believe."

"Ah,--but one I know something of."

"I don't think there is anything in that, Brotherton;--I don't, indeed,
or I shouldn't have brought him here."

"I do, though. And as to not bringing him here, why shouldn't you bring
him? If she don't go off with him, she will with somebody else, and the
sooner the better, according to my ideas." This was a matter upon which
Mr. De Baron was not prepared to dilate, and he therefore changed the
subject.

"My dear Lord Giblet, it is such a pleasure to me to meet you here,"
old Mrs. Jones said to that young nobleman. "When I was told you were
to be at Rudham, it determined me at once." This was true, for there
was no more persistent friend living than old Mrs. Jones, though it
might be doubted whether, on this occasion, Lord Giblet was the friend
on whose behalf she had come to Rudham.

"It's very nice, isn't it?" said Lord Giblet, gasping.

"Hadn't we a pleasant time of it with our little parties in Grosvenor
Place?"

"Never liked anything so much in life; only I don't think that fellow
Jack De Baron, dances so much better than other people, after all?"

"Who says he does? But I'll tell you who dances well. Olivia Green was
charming in the Kappa-kappa. Don't you think so?"

"Uncommon pretty." Lord Giblet was quite willing to be understood to
admire Miss Patmore Green, though he thought it hard that people should
hurry him on into matrimony.

"The most graceful girl I ever saw in my life, certainly," said Mrs.
Montacute Jones. "His Royal Highness, when he heard of the engagement,
said that you were the happiest man in London."

Lord Giblet could not satisfy himself by declaring that H.R.H. was an
old fool, as poor Mary had done on a certain occasion,--but at the
present moment he did not feel at all loyal to the Royal Family
generally. Nor did he, in the least, know how to answer Mrs. Jones. She
had declared the engagement as a fact, and he did not quite dare to
deny it altogether. He had, in an unguarded moment, when the weather
had been warm and the champagne cool, said a word with so definite a
meaning that the lady had been justified in not allowing it to pass by
as idle. The lady had accepted him, and on the following morning he had
found the lock of hair and the little stud which she had given him, and
had feverish reminiscences of a kiss. But surely he was not a bird t