and who, like Chili vinegar, was sour though ardent.

Unconscious, for once, of the attention he excited, Sloperton dismounted and entered his lodgings. Neither the hospitable smile of the martyred Miss Finkle, as she opened the door, nor the openly-admiring glances of Miss Tiddy and Miss Nopetty, nor the sidelong ones of Miss Simpson and Miss Brown, shed any gleam of comfort into the Captain's breast as he walked hastily up-stairs. Not one look or sign of notice did he vouchsafe in return before he slammed the door of his sitting-room. There was a pink and perfumed note on the table (exactly like one stuck conspicuously in the frame of the mirror over the mantelpiece), which the Captain snatched up, but, instead of reading it, wrenched it in twain, with an improper expression, and flung the fragments into the grate; while his servant, coming into the room with a message, was dismissed with a vehement abruptness that testified to his extreme discomposure. It was long since he had been so ruffled, for his habitual successes had ill prepared him to sustain a repulse. If he could have found comfort anywhere, it would have been in that room, for on the walls were multiplied pictures of the object of his tenderest devotion-viz., himself. He was represented in chalks, and water-colours, and oils; sitting, standing, reading, and riding; in plain clothes and undress and full dress; with his helmet beside him, and with it on his head. In the contemplation of these he always found solace, but now he didn't even look at them.

He sat revolving the direst projects of revenge. He would marry the handsomest, most accomplished, and most fashionable girl he could find, and bring her down to Doddington to harrow up the soul of the then toolate-repentant Lady Lee. He would seek an opportunity to meet her, and wither her by his calm scorn. He would insult Bagot, who, after fleecing him, was doubtless now enjoying his discomfiture-even Kitty Fillett was included in these schemes of vengeance.

In this humour he was found by Mr Oates, who came rattling up-stairs

like a tornado, followed by a bull-dog and two terriers. Mr Oates's own spirits were so high as to be altogether out of the reach of calamity, which rendered him by no means a desirable companion in the present low state of Sloperton's; and the Captain asked him, with some irritation," Whether the fact of his having nerves of his own like fiddle-strings entitled him to torture other people's with his infernal clatter?"

"Beg pardon of your nerves, Nobby," said the irreverent Mr Oates, seating himself on the table, and dangling one leg to and fro. "Don't faint yet, there's a good fellow, as I've something to tell you. Shall I borrow a smelling-bottle from Ribs-andankles?" (This was Mr Oates's sobriquet for Miss Finkle, in allusion to the most prominent features of her anatomy.)

Sloperton put on a look of lofty contempt, but did not succeed in disconcerting the audacious Mr Oates in the least.

"Sloper, my boy," said that gentleman, "I wish you had waited for my advice before you paid forfeit in that Goshawk business. I stood to my bet, you know-'twas only fifty; besides, my maxim is, If you lose you lose, and there's an end on't."

"What!-don't you think I got well out of it?" said Sloperton.

"Pooh!" said Oates; "'twas a plant-a regular do. Just listen, now, how I discovered it. I had mentioned the matter to Chick, a sporting friend of mine, who is training a horse quietly down at I mentioned you had

a heavy bet against the mare, and asked him to find out all he could about her. Now it so happened, that not long ago he observed Seager and another man, who, from his description, must be old Lee, entering a stable very early in the morning. They had a mare brought out to try, and Chick saw her come back lame."

"Good God! you don't say so!" exclaimed Sloperton, who listened with suddenly-aroused interest.

"Lame, and no mistake," repeated Oates. "Well, upon hearing from me, and coupling what I had told him with what he had seen, he went to the stable quietly, to try and pump the groom in charge of the mare; but he

was close, and wouldn't peach-said the mare was all right, and 'twas only her way of going. But, in a day or two afterwards, the groom comes to my friend Chick, and tells him that Seager had been fool enough to thrash him soundly for some neglect, and in revenge he would tell him, now, that the mare was dead lame, and that the 'vet,' whose name he mentioned, believed she'd got navicular. I always thought that Seager a bit of a leg. Ain't you sorry, now, Sloper, that you paid away your money so easily? "No," said Sloperton, grinding his

teeth; "I never was so glad of anything in my life. I'd have paid double the money, cheerfully, for the chance it gives me. You say he thinks the other man was Lee?"

"So he says; but that's easily found out from the groom. Besides, you can ascertain whether Lee was, or was not, at the Heronry about that time."

"Exactly," said Sloperton. "We must follow this up. Only let us bring it home to 'em, Oates, my boy, and I shall think the money well bestowed. I'll push the thing to the utmost."

Sloperton lost no time in pursuing the trace thus afforded him. He questioned the groom himself, who confirmed his previous statement as to the lameness of the mare and the nature of it, and afforded conclusive evidence that the stranger who had accompanied his master was Colonel Bagot Lee. He tried also to sound the veterinary surgeon, but that gentleman was never to be found when wanted in the business, and there was, therefore, reason to suppose he was in the interests of the opposite party. However, the materials collected being laid before an eminent man of law, were at once pronounced by him sufficient to support proceedings for fraud against Seager and the Colonel; and Sloperton, still smarting from his recent repulse and losses, lost no time in commencing a prosecution.

The first notice of this was a terrible shock to Bagot. He cowered beneath it, hid himself at the Heronry, and would see no one except his confederate Seager.

But in a little while he began to hold up his head again. By a curious mental process, common in such cases, he began himself to receive the colouring which he had wished to give to the transaction as the true one. He actually persuaded himself that he had been from the first ignorant and unsuspicious of the mare's true state; that, in recommending Sloperton to pay forfeit, he had given him conscientious advice, quite independent of any hint to that effect from Seager; and that he, Bagot, had been merely

an innocent tool in the whole business, and was now an extremely illused man. So completely did he surrender himself to this delusion, that he even reasoned on the like imaginary grounds in his conversations with Seager; and that gentleman, far from contradicting, rather encouraged the hallucination, which he privately chuckled over as one of the best jokes he had ever heard, and only regretted that the delicate nature of the subject prevented him from sharing his amusement with some appreciating friend.

"You know," poor Bagot would say, over his grog, "you know the mare went splendidly that morninga most astonishing mare. Very well, I was Sloperton's friend, you see-as good a friend as ever he had; by Jupiter, sir, he knew nothing at all about billiards till I showed him. I was the man that showed him how to cut in the red off the spot, and how to bring both balls back into baulk, and half-a-dozen other good strokes. Well, sir, what was more natural than for me to give him a bit of friendly advice?-though, to be sure, it was against your interests- but that couldn't be helped, you know, Seager."

Seager would look at him fixedly, with a comical expression in his hard, unwinking eye, but with perfect gravity.

"Therefore," Bagot would go on, with an argumentative motion of his head, "therefore, though 'twas, as I say, contrary to your interests, and though you, Seager, were also a friend of mine that I had a great regard for,

yet, as a man of honour- -as a man of honour and uprightness, who likes to see everything upon the square, I was in duty bound to give him the advice which I did. I've seen the mare,' I said to him; 'I know what she can do. You're a young man; I've had great experience-pay the forfeit.' And now, damme, sir, he turns round upon me in the most ungrateful and ungentlemanly way, and says I got him into the trap-says, by gad, sir, 'twas my fault." And the poor Colonel, with a profound conviction of the ingratitude of mankind in general, and of Sloperton in particular, would shake his head, and bury his red nose in his tumbler.

"What a shocking thing 'twould be," Mr Seager would remark, with grave irony, "if Sloperton should persuade the jury to believe him. Quite horrible, you know-and the law is infernally uncertain. Lots of innocent people get shopped, you know."

"Jury, sir!" Bagot would roar; "there's nothing to go to a jury. "Twill never come into court, sir!"

If it never had come into court, that would have been owing less to the excellence of Bagot's case than to the exertions of Seager. That gen-, tleman was now in his element-bullying and bribing witnesses, suppressing evidence, here and there inventing a little, and throwing out hints for the guidance of his legal advisers which impressed those gentlemen with a great idea of his astuteness. Plots and counterplots, concealed efforts at compromise, incessant attempts to discover the enemy's weak points and to conceal his own, and frequent consultations with low attorneys accustomed to dirty work, enlivened his existence, and called all his faculties into play; and, as the racing season was luckily drawing to a close, he was able to lend his undivided energies to the business.

Meanwhile they were out on bail till the trial should come on. To find security for this bail, and to meet the more pressing demands of the tradesmen in town, who, by arresting him, might just now have placed him in an extremely awkward predicament, had nearly exhausted all Bagot's hardearned thousand pounds. He at

first joined Seager in his efforts, especially in the matter of the compromise, to effect which he would have given Sloperton notes of hand to any amount; but Sloperton's nature was vindictive, and had these offers been as substantial as they were munificent, he would have rejected them. The Captain, with a firmness that showed how deeply his vanity had been wounded, steadily insisted on his pound of flesh; and Bagot, taking Seager's advice to leave the management of the business to him, went back to the Heronry and drank harder than ever.

He was not, however, allowed to remain here undisturbed. Applications for money from Seager, for the purpose of carrying on the war, were frequent and pressing. Besides this, many of the tradesmen to whom he was indebted, aware of the proceedings pending against him, became loud in their demands for payment, accompanying them with threats in case of non-compliance; and Bagot, foreseeing that an arrest for debt would not only prevent him from doing all in his power to prevent the trial from taking place, but would also prevent his evading the penalty of the law in case of judgment being given against him, was driven to satisfy them with something more substantial than fair words, and to pay the more menacing in full. Mr Dubbley, too, was urgent for payment -or rather Mr Dubbley's lawyer, for the recovery of the debt was now in legal hands; and though Bagot did not fear that the Squire would really proceed to extremities against him, yet his conduct served greatly to add to the embarrassments of the unfortunate Colonel.

Seager had not failed to hint to the Colonel the expediency of using his position as guardian to Julius to obtain a present supply. Bagot would not have hesitated to do this-sheltering his conscience, as usual, under the plea of its being merely a loan, to be repaid hereafter-but it was not in his power. His guardianship of the young baronet was personal, merely-the property being managed by trustees, who, as Bagot had already ascertained by experiment, would not permit any infringement of

the interests of their young charge, however plausibly it might be veiled, nor indeed any interference on his part. Apprised of the uselessness of any attempt of this kind, Seager became louder and more direct in his insinuations as to the wrong Bagot had suffered by the interposition of the present heir between him and affluence. "Once rid of that little beggar," Seager ventured to say, "we should go through this infernal business with flying colours." Bagot made no answer at the time; but Seager noticed that, instead of petting the boy as formerly, he now once or twice repulsed him with mo

roseness.

"By the Lord, Lee," Seager said one day, "if I had a young nephew of that sort sticking in my throat, I'm half inclined to think he wouldn't stick there long. I'd put him on a vicious pony, or set him to play with a dog that I thought was going mad, or try some dodge that gave him a chance of going to kingdom come without compromising myself. If he would only pretend to be dead for a couple of months or so, 'twould answer our purpose. In the mean time the trial comes on in six weeks, and no funds forthcoming."

Another time Seager, observing the Colonel to be more dismal than usual, told him, to comfort him, that they needn't want for money to carry on the business.

“How so?" inquired Bagot, with interest. "Where is it to come from?"

"I didn't say anything about it before," said Seager, "for, knowing your sentiments for her ladyship, I thought 'twas best to ascertain myself how she was disposed to take the thing before mentioning it to you; so, yesterday, I went and spoke to her quietly. I set before her a strong picture of persecuted innocence" (here Seager winked facetiously), "hinted darkly at the mischief that threatened you, spoke of the necessity of avoiding family disgrace, and finally told her that nothing but a supply of the ready was wanting to avert it."

"The devil you did!" exclaimed Bagot. "And pray, sir, who authorised you to make any application of the kind? Cursed officious!" mut

tered the Colonel, his lips trembling with excitement.

"To be sure," said Mr Seager, ironically, "cursed officious! -oh, yes! 'Twas such a pleasure to me to undertake the office! - talking to women of that sort is so much in my line! And her way of treating me was so pleasant-not cool nor contemptuous, oh no! Didn't look at me as if I was a toad! not in the least!"

Well, sir," said the Colonel, presently, “ and what did she say? Let out some spite, ah? Cool indifference, with a touch of venom for me? By the Lord, I can fancy her-I can fancy her, with her infernal lofty calmness. Pretended pity, I suppose, but said I was quite competent to manage my own affairs-wouldn't presume to interfere in them-or something of that sort. Oh, I know her well."

"Quite wrong," said Mr Seager; "she said at once that she was ready to assist you to the utmost of her power. You say she's clever, Lee, but she seems to me awfully soft. She sat down directly (luckily, without inquiring into the particulars of the case), and took pen and ink to write you a message to that effect; but she seemed to find some difficulty in addressing you, for she said, after tearing up two or three sheets, that as I seemed to be in Colonel Lee's confidence, I would perhaps be good enough to deliver the message verbally, which, perhaps, he would prefer to a communication from herself."

"All sheer humbug, sir," said Bagot; "she knows I've got power over her, and she wants to propitiate me-a sprat to catch a herring, sir. She knows deuced well I'd rather rot than take a sous from her."

"Why, of course, she must have a motive of some kind; she isn't such a fool, you may be sure, as to offer all this without expecting to get something by it. But you needn't disturb yourself about her motives-all you want is her money."

"One word!" said Bagot, angrily. "I'll have none of her money-not if she offered it on her knees. And I beg you'll not interfere any more in that quarter, as you will only oblige me to tell her what I now tell you”—

"Well," said Seager, "please yourself. Without a supply of the needful 'twill go hard with us, and I shall make preparations for a bolt; I advise you to do the same."

Seager could not comprehend Bagot's scruples, which would not allow him to accept an obligation from a person he disliked-more than disliked, in-. deed, for his feelings towards Lady Lee had now risen to positive hatred. He had at once divined aright the cause of Sloperton's sudden acrimo

nious hostility; and the account which his inquiries elicited from the watchful Fillett, of the circumstances of the Captain's last visit, her ladyship's abrupt retirement to her own room, and Sloperton's retreat with every appearance of discomfiture, quite satisfied him of the correctness of his surmise. Accordingly, his hostility towards Lady Lee was immensely aggravated when he considered her, in addition to former offences, as the cause of his present anxiety.

One dreary autumn afternoon Bagot sat in his room perusing a letter from Seager, who had gone to town to look after the business of the trial. The Colonel abhorred the subject so much that he could scarcely bring himself to read the details which Seager had furnished him with-but at length he applied himself doggedly to the task. The letter fluttered in his hand, the unsteadiness of which had increased so much that he did not trust himself to shave more than a very small patch of chin, and had let his large grizzled whiskers effect a junction across his upper lip through the medium of a bristly mustache, exhibiting altogether such a quantity of hair that one might have fancied he had thrust his nose and eyes through a hole in an old wig.

Though Bagot did succeed, after a fashion, in excluding a belief in his own complicity and consequent liability to disgrace, yet it hovered round him always in an indefinite form, colouring his meditations with the most sombre hues, and showing his future through a darkening medium.

He

had now made some steps, even in years, down the declivity of life, and his fast style of existence had of course accelerated his progress. Old intimacies were disappearing, swallowed up by matrimony or business, or the grave; a young set were rising round him, who regarded him doubtfully, withholding both the confidence they gave to those of their own age, and the respect that should have attached to one of his. Their society was more necessary to him than his to them, and therefore, though he resented, at

first, such undue liberties as the more reckless were inclined to take with him, and had put several forward young gentlemen down with great majesty, yet, finding that he must either put up with their irreverent jokes or else painfully narrow his circle, he was fain to allow himself to be regarded in a comic light. The loss of this kind of dilapidated popularity would seem trifling-but it had almost become Bagot's all. What substitute for it had he to look to? Where was the promise that those comforts which Macbeth had learnt ought to accompany old age would be his? He must continue to be "old Lee "-" that precious old sinner the Colonel "—or nothing.

Mr Seager's epistle being one that might be required for future reference, Bagot opened a drawer filled with old letters, in order to put it by after reading it. With a view of diverting his mind from its gloom for a moment, he occupied himself in turning over some of these. Presently he took the drawer out, and placing it on the table between himself and the brandy bottle, sat searching among the heaps of letters, sometimes pausing to turn one right side up before flinging it aside. He had not thought he had so many of them by him; the writers of some were almost forgotten in person and name. It is not a cheerful task, under any circumstances, this of looking over old letters - there is a sadness in glancing at bits of the past through these loopholes ;and a troubadour of our own time, the venerable Milnes, reading in extreme old age the epistolary effusions