THE BOARDING-HOUSE. 191 



Why, that !" 



" Ah ! you have done it nicely now, Sir/' sobbed the frightened 

 Agnes, as a tapping was heard at Mrs. Tibbs' bed-room door, which 

 would have beat any twelve woodpeckers hollow. 



" Mrs. Tibbs ! Mrs. Tibbs !" called out Mrs. Bloss. " Mrs. Tibbs, 

 pray get up." (Here the imitation of a woodpecker was resumed 

 with tenfold violence.) 



" O dear dear !" exclaimed the wretched partner of the depraved 

 Tibbs. " She's knocking at my door. We must be discovered. 

 What will they think ?" 



" Mrs. Tibbs ! Mrs. Tibbs !" screamed the woodpecker again. 



" What's the matter ?" shouted Gobler, bursting out of the back 

 drawing-room, like the dragon at Astley's only without the portable 

 gas in his countenance. 



" Oh, Mr. Gobler !'' cried Mrs. Bloss, with a proper approximation 

 to hysterics ; " I think the house is on fire, or else there's thieves in 

 it. I have heard the most dreadful noises." 



" The devil you have !" shouted Gobler again, bouncing back into 

 his den, in happy imitation of the aforesaid dragon, and return- 

 ing immediately with a lighted candle. " Why, what's this? 

 Wisbottle ! Tomkins ! O'Bleary ! Agnes ! What the deuce, all up 

 and dressed ?" 



" Astonishing !" said Mrs. Bloss, who had run down stairs, and 

 taken Mr. Gobler's arm. 



" Call Mrs. Tibbs directly, somebody," said Gobler, turning into 

 the front drawing-room. " What! Mrs. Tibbs and Mr. Evenson !!" 



" Mrs. Tibbs and Mr. Evenson !" repeated every body, as that 

 unhappy pair were discovered, Mrs. Tibbs seated in an arm-chair by 

 the fire-place, and Mr. Evenson standing by her side. 



We must leave the scene that ensued to the reader's imagination. 

 We could tell how Mrs. Tibbs forthwith fainted away, and how it 

 required the united strength of Mr. Wisbottle and Mr. Alfred Tom- 

 kins to hold her in her chair; how Mr. Evenson explained, and how 

 his explanation was evidently disbelieved it ; how Agnes repelled 

 the accusations of Mrs. Tibbs, by proving that she was negociating 

 with Mr. O'Bleary to influence her mistress's affections in his 

 behalf; and how Mr. Gobler threw a damp counterpane on the 

 hopes of Mr. O'Bleary by avowing that he (Gobler) had already 

 proposed to, and been accepted by, Mrs. Bloss ; how Agnes was 

 discharged from that lady's service ; how Mr. O'Bleary discharged 

 himself from Mrs. Tibbs' house, without going through the form of 

 previously discharging his bill ; and how that disappointed young 

 gentleman rails against England and the English, and vows there is 

 no virtue or fine feeling extant, " except in Ireland." We repeat 

 that we could tell all this, but we love to exercise our self-denial, and 

 we therefore prefer leaving it to be imagined. 



The lady whom we have hitherto described as Mrs. Bloss, is no 

 more. Mrs. Gobler exists : Mrs. Bloss has left us for ever. In a 

 secluded retreat in Newington Butts, far far removed from the 

 noisy strife of that great boarding-house the world, the enviable 



