290 THE "GOINGS ON" AT BRAMSBY HALL. 



week, and the pigeons were alive. Nor were these dainties nicely 

 packed each in its separate department of cloth or newspaper, but all 

 stewing together. My resolution was taken. I distributed the con- 

 tents of my basket among my good friends the attorneys, packed my 

 clothes in my blue bag (the only use a young lawyer has for it), took 

 a place in the earliest stage, and on the second evening from starting 

 found myself at Bramsby. Dinner was concluded, and the 'squire 

 was with the ladies in the drawing-room. He received me as kindly, 

 but not with such boisterous cordiality as his wont was, and I thought 

 he did not look so red as usual. My aunt welcomed me with a long 

 bow and serpentine courtesy, and I thought she looked very like a 

 milliner. Bessy met me with a smile of pleasure, and she looked 

 beautiful. Another person was there, whom my aunt introduced to 

 me as Mr. Le Grange. At one glance I hated him as a Bramsby 

 should hate. Such an odious compound of ugliness and affectation 

 I had never before seen. He was about thirty years of age, and 

 deeply pitted or rather scarred with the small pox, yellow as a West 

 Indian that had lived on treacle, with straight, black, greasy hair, 

 and jagged eyes that looked like ill-opened oysters. His mouth was 

 moist, his large teeth matched his skin, a crop of pimples speckled 

 his forehead. So loathsome an object dressed after the prints of 

 Lord Byron, with bare neck, open waistcoat, and flowing linen 

 might well have turned the bile of a saint. I felt that nothing but 

 his death could satisfy me. 



"Who is this Mr. Le Grange?" I said to my aunt at breakfast 

 next morning. 



" Who is he !" she snapped out with the look of a dragon ; " this 

 Mr. Le Grange is my friend, and my near relation." 



" He is a very nice young man," said Bessy archly, in answer 

 to the same question ; f( so romantic and poetical ! so like Lord 

 Byron !" 



" His fate is settled/' I muttered to myself. 



" Who is this Mr. Le Grange?" I asked the 'squire over our third 

 bottle in the evening. I saw that I had touched the string of all my 

 uncle's sorrows. 



" Who is he, Bob !" he thundered out. " D him ! Who is 



he ? you must ask my wife if you want to know. She brought him 

 home from a watering-place six months since, where she went for her 

 health, and he has been tucked up to her apron-string ever since. 



She calls him cousin. D n his cousinship ! Bramsby is Bramsby 



no longer ; I can't call my house my own. Jack Slingsby says, ' the 

 squire is sewed up in a pair of his wife's stays.' But I'll tell you 

 what, Bob " 



" Coffee is waiting," said the bland voice of my aunt, who had 

 slipped into the room unperceived. 



Had the last trump burst upon his ear, my uncle could not have 

 been more startled. His tones were hushed, the frown froze on his 

 forehead, his uplifted hand sunk by his side, and, dropping his ears 

 like a cowed spaniel, he slunk after his spouse into the drawing- 

 room. 



We found Mr. Le Grange, who had left the dining-room with the 



