“Indeed, Dinah?” said Mr. Winterblossom, gravely taking out his spectacles, and wiping them before he opened the roll of paper; “some boy's daubing, I suppose, whose pa and ma wish to get him into the Trustees' School, and so are beating about for a little interest. – But I am drained dry – I put three lads in last season; and if it had not been my particular interest with the secretary, who asks my opinion now and then, I could not have managed it. But giff-gaff, say I. – Eh! What, in the devil's name, is this? – Here is both force and keeping – Who can this be, my lady? – Do but see the sky-line – why, this is really a little bit – an exquisite little bit – Who the devil can it be? and how can he have stumbled upon the dog-hole in the Old Town, and the snarling b – I beg your ladyship ten thousand pardons – that kennels there?”
“I dare say, my lady,” said a little miss of fourteen, her eyes growing rounder and rounder, and her cheeks redder and redder, as she found herself speaking, and so many folks listening – “O la! I dare say it is the same gentleman we met one day in the Low-wood walk, that looked like a gentleman, and yet was none of the company, and that you said was a handsome man.”
“I did not say handsome, Maria,” replied her ladyship; “ladies never say men are handsome – I only said he looked genteel and interesting.”
“And that, my lady,” said the young parson, bowing and smiling, “is, I will be judged by the company, the more flattering compliment of the two – We shall be jealous of this Unknown presently.”
“Nay, but,” continued the sweetly communicative Maria, with some real and some assumed simplicity, “your ladyship forgets – for you said presently after, you were sure he was no gentleman, for he did not run after you with your glove which you had dropped – and so I went back myself to find your ladyship's glove, and he never offered to help me, and I saw him closer than your ladyship did, and I am sure he is handsome, though he is not very civil.”
“You speak a little too much and too loud, miss,” said Lady Penelope, a natural blush reinforcing the nuance of rouge by which it was usually superseded.
“What say you to that, Squire Mowbray?” said the elegant Sir Bingo Binks.
“A fair challenge to the field, Sir Bingo,” answered the squire; “when a lady throws down the gauntlet, a gentleman may throw the handkerchief.”
“I have always the benefit of your best construction, Mr. Mowbray,” said the lady, with dignity. “I suppose Miss Maria has contrived this pretty story for your amusement. I can hardly answer to Mr. Digges, for bringing her into company where she receives encouragement to behave so.”
“Nay, nay, my lady,” said the president, “you must let the jest pass by; and since this is really such an admirable sketch, you must honour us with your opinion, whether the company can consistently with propriety make any advances to this man.”
“In my opinion,” said her ladyship, the angry spot still glowing on her brow, “there are enough of men among us already – I wish I could say gentlemen – As matters stand, I see little business ladies can have at St. Ronan's.”
This was an intimation which always brought the Squire back to good-breeding, which he could make use of when he pleased. He deprecated her ladyship's displeasure, until she told him, in returning good humour, that she really would not trust him unless he brought his sister to be security for his future politeness.
“Clara, my lady,” said Mowbray, “is a little wilful; and I believe your ladyship must take the task of unharbouring her into your own hands. What say you to a gipsy party up to my old shop? – It is a bachelor's house – you must not expect things in much order; but Clara would be honoured” —
The Lady Penelope eagerly accepted the proposal of something like a party, and, quite reconciled with Mowbray, began to enquire whether she might bring the stranger artist with her; “that is,” said her ladyship, looking to Dinah, “if he be a gentleman.”
Here Dinah interposed her assurance, “that the gentleman at Meg Dods's was quite and clean a gentleman, and an illustrated poet besides.”
“An illustrated poet, Dinah?” said Lady Penelope; “you must mean an illustrious poet.”
“I dare to say your ladyship is right,” said Dinah, dropping a curtsy.
A joyous flutter of impatient anxiety was instantly excited through all the blue-stocking faction of the company, nor were the news totally indifferent to the rest of the community. The former belonged to that class, who, like the young Ascanius, are ever beating about in quest of a tawny lion, though they are much more successful in now and then starting a great bore;16 and the others, having left all their own ordinary affairs and subjects of interest at home, were glad to make a matter of importance of the most trivial occurrence. A mighty poet, said the former class – who could it possibly be? – All names were recited – all Britain scrutinized, from Highland hills to the Lakes of Cumberland – from Sydenham Common to St. James's Place – even the Banks of the Bosphorus were explored for some name which might rank under this distinguished epithet. – And then, besides his illustrious poesy, to sketch so inimitably! – who could it be? And all the gapers, who had nothing of their own to suggest, answered with the antistrophe, “Who could it be?”
The Claret-Club, which comprised the choicest and firmest adherents of Squire Mowbray and the Baronet – men who scorned that the reversion of one bottle of wine should furnish forth the feast of to-morrow, though caring nought about either of the fine arts in question, found out an interest of their own, which centred in the same individual.
“I say, little Sir Bingo,” said the Squire, “this is the very fellow that we saw down at the Willow-slack on Saturday – he was tog'd gnostically enough, and cast twelve yards of line with one hand – the fly fell like a thistledown on the water.”
“Uich!” answered the party he addressed, in the accents of a dog choking in the collar.
“We saw him pull out the salmon yonder,” said Mowbray; “you remember – clean fish – the tide-ticks on his gills – weighed, I dare say, a matter of eighteen pounds.”
“Sixteen!” replied Sir Bingo, in the same tone of strangulation.
“None of your rigs, Bing!” said his companion, “ – nearer eighteen than sixteen!”
“Nearer sixteen, by – !”
“Will you go a dozen of blue on it to the company?” said the Squire.
“No, d – me!” croaked the Baronet – “to our own set I will.”
“Then, I say done!” quoth the Squire.
And “Done!” responded the Knight; and out came their red pocketbooks.
“But who shall decide the bet?” said the Squire, “The genius himself, I suppose; they talk of asking him here, but I suppose he will scarce mind quizzes like them.”
“Write myself – John Mowbray,” said the Baronet.
“You, Baronet! – you write!” answered the Squire, “d – me, that cock won't fight – you won't.”
“I will,” growled Sir Bingo, more articulately than usual.
“Why, you can't!” said Mowbray. “You never wrote a line in your life, save those you were whipped for at school.”
“I can write – I will write!” said Sir Bingo. “Two to one I will.”
And there the affair rested, for the council of the company were in high consultation concerning the most proper manner of opening a communication with the mysterious stranger; and the voice of Mr. Winterblossom, whose tones, originally fine, age had