Part 4 (1/2)

Martha Thresher showed him the bed, showed him flowers I had planted, and a Spanish chestnut tree just peeping

'Ha!' said he, beas: ' debtor and friend!' He kissed her on the cheek

John Thresher cried out: 'Why, dame, you trembles like a maid'

She spoke very faintly, and was red in the face up to the time of our departure John stood like a soldier We drove away fro crowd of cricketers and farun 'A royal salvo!' said otten to reward and take a particular farewell of any one of ht it was true, until on our way up the sandy lane, which offered us a last close view of the old wall-flower farm front, I saw little Mabel Sinter, often irl, ould have danced on Sunday for a fairing, and eaten gingerbread nuts during a ghost-story She was sitting by a furze-bush in flower, cherishi+ng in her lap a lamb that had been worried She looked half up at ood-bye, thought I, and reotten that of all the others

CHAPTER IV I HAVE A TASTE OF GRANDEUR

Though I had not previously seen a postillion in ularly on their horses before ht upon the marvel of their sudden apparition and connection withthe pleasant music of the many feet at the trot, and tried to explain toup and down hed and kissedonce shown me the inside of a piano when the keys were knocked My love for hi: I perceived that he waser able to do harladness at their defeat, to ask what had become of Shylock's descendant

Mrs Waddy welcoine that it was at the door of her old house It was in a wide street opening on a splendid square, and pillars were before the houses, and inside there was the enchant ferns, in a rock-basin under athat gloith kings of England, copied from boys' history books All the servants were drawn up in the hall to do ho than the wonder of the sweet-ss Richest of treats, a monkey was introduced to nedly; 'he says he must have his jester Indeed it is no joke to h her voice was melancholy From her I now learnt that my name was Richmond Roy, and not Harry Riche Everybody in the house wore a happy expression of countenance, except the monkey, as too busy

As we land painted on the back-s Mrs Waddy said: 'It is considered to give aword, and pursued: 'as it should' I insisted upon going to the top floor, where I expected to find Willia link between John Thresher and me presented himself only to carry my recollections of the Dipwell of yesterday as far back into the past as the old Nors, downstairs,' I said, surveying theht lead one to think it their lamentable fate 'And did the people look at you as you drove along through the streets, Master Richmond?'

I said 'Yes,' in turn; and then we left off answering, but questioned one another, which is a quicker way of getting at facts; I know it is with boys and women Mrs Waddy cared much less to hear of Dipwell and its inhabitants than of the sensation created everywhere by our equipage I noticed that when her voice was not melancholy her face was

She showeda crown over it, in a roonificent dreaolden doors when I knew that the bed was ht it almost as nice as a place by my father's side

'Don't you like it, Mrs Waddy?' I said

She shed 'Like it? Oh! yes, my dear, to be sure I do I only hope it won't vanish' She simpered and looked sad

I had too many distractions, or I should have asked her whether htful new ho; it appeared tomoved violently except myself, and my principal concern was lest any one should carryI was introduced to a co wine after dinner with hed is of England who could not find rooone down to the cellars

'They are going,' hed prodigiously 'They are going, gentleood wine, like old Port, which they tell us is going also Favour er'

They drank to me heartily, but my father had fallen , and lessons in boxing and wrestling, and lessons in French frooverness, at whose appearanceto dance a minuet, so exuberantly courteous was he; and lessons in Latin froht, but did not distinguish otherwise than occasionally to take down Latin sentences in a notebook fros My father told the man who instructed me in the art of self-defence that our family had always patronized his profession I wrestled ten ularly thrown On fine afternoons I was dressed in black velvet for a drive in the park, where my father uncovered his head to numbers of people, and was et na you to bear that in o to his opera-box; and we visited the House of Lords and the House of Coh he complained of the decay of British eloquence, and mourned for the days of Chatham, and William Pitt (our old friend of the cake and the raspberry jaed the orators with approving er laid stress on e 'Now I have you in the very atmosphere, that will come of itself,' he said I wished to knohether I was likely to be transported suddenly to so save a convulsion of the earth would do it, which comforted me, for I took the firmness of the earth in perfect trust We spoke of our old Sunday walks to St Paul's and West a fashi+onable congregation pleased him better The pew-opener curtseyed to none as she did to him Forbesides that had gone--I knew not what At the first indication of gloo ue out before hion in a piece of tapestry, would resume his old playfulness, and try to be the sas Then we read the Arabian Nights together, or, rather, he read the out the incidents as we rode or drove abroad An oetfulness to sprinkle pepper on the creaation concerning ician to who and thefair Persians He would frequently ejaculate that he resembled the Three Calendars inmy recovery from measles, he one day hired an actor in a theatre, and put a cloth round his neck, and seated him in a chair, rubbed his chin with soap, and played the part of the Barber over hihed so ot her hands at her sides, and kept on gasping, 'Oh, sir! oh!' while the Barber hurried away fro man to consult his pretended astrolabe in the next roo the sun's altitude, and consulting its willingness for the irefreshed to have learnt the sun's favourable opinion, and gabbling at an immense rate, full of barber's business The servants were allowed to be spectators; but as soon as the young man was shaved, my father dismissed them with the tone of a master No wonder they loved hi I had when she spoke of his exposure to the risk of ain; it added a curious romantic tenderness to ainst the world To have his hand in ht Then it was that I could think earnestly of Prince Ahmed and the kind and beautiful Peribanou, who My favourite drea an arrow in ahis arrow, and wondering where the arrow had flown to, and wandering after it till he passed out of green fields to grassy rocks, and to a stony desert, where at last he found his arrow at an enor line, and there was the desert all about hi to show herself to hiered for hi this Arabian life, we sat on a carpet that flew to the Continent, where I fell sick, and was cured by s at an apple; and h the aid of a telescope, which told us the titles of the hotels ready to receive us As for the cities and cathedrals, the hot meadows under mountains, the rivers and the castles-they were littleand shutting at rando from place to place must have seeenerally as quick to cry as to laugh, and was never at peace between any two e lady My fatherthe nu the name of Peribanou, which I bestowed on her for her delicious talk of the blue and red-striped posts that would spout up fountains of pearls if they were plucked from their beds, and the palaces that had flown out of the farthest corners of the world, and the city that would so bare sea-ripple to say 'Where? where?' as they rolled over

I would have seen her marry my father happily She was like rest and dreaement to correspond for life Her nao always to the Horse Guards to discover in what part of the world Colonel Goodwinwhen I wanted to write to her I, in return, could give no per 'To write to you would be the sa to a river,'

she said; and insisted that I should drop the odious narew a man My father quarrelled with Colonel Goodwin Months after I felt as if I had only just been torn from Clara, but she stood in a mist, irrecoverably distant I had no other friend

Twelve dozen of splendid Burgundy were the fruit of our tour, to be laid down at Dipwell faral man, embarked in my own shi+p, as my father said I did not taste the wine 'Porter for me that day, please God!' cried Mrs Waddy, who did My father eyed her with pity, and ordered her to send the wine down to Dipwell, which was done He took me between his knees, and said impressively, 'Now, Richie, twelve dozen of the best that ates of manhood Few fathers can say that to their sons, s on the day! If I' box,' his voice shook, and he added, 'gone to Peribanou underneath, you know, ree, and bought it and had it bottled in his own presence while you were asleep in the Eundy city, and swore that, whatever came to them both, his son should drink the wine of princes on the day of his hly exalted, and he sat in a great flush

I promised him I would bend my steps toward Dipwell to be there on ed himself to be there in spirit at least, bodily if possible We sealed the subject with so a poet to co day at Dipwell The thought of the day in store for us sent h I had been in the presence of rew extremely melancholy at the mention of it

'Lord only knohere we shall all be by that tihed