544 The Sycophant. QNov. 



that her husband's forehead still leaned against the window, and that his 

 eye was fixed upon the long, unbroken line of avenue, whicli the sha- 

 dows of evening were rendering every instant more indistinct. " What 

 does it signify, after all, Bess ?" he murmured, drawing his hand with 

 no gentle motion across his eyes ; " there is no doubt of his returning 

 governor-general, at the very least!" 



Years passed on ; Sir Basil IMonkton Bearfoot had paid the debt of 

 nature, after suffering (like most public men, who deserve well of their 

 country) much unmerited cahimny and reproach : and his brother, also, 

 slept the everlasting sleep in the tomb of his fathers ; the elder girls 

 were either married, or old maids ; and if Julia had not received her 

 parrot, she made up the loss, by becoming, like most other women, a 

 parrot herself. The eldest son of the Bearfoots bade fair to pei-petuate the 

 lack-wit of his father, and was, to speak in homely phrase, a dosing, 

 smoking, club-going, English 'squire, with less money, and more neces- 

 sities, than had ever fallen to the share of his progenitors. 



It was on a fine and cheerful day, that a group of military-looking men 

 were assembled under the piazzas of the United Service Club, discussing 

 the most current topics of conversation, and passing jests and remarks on 

 the pedestrians who sauntered up and down Pail-Mall, or loitered to 

 gaze on the engraved glories which grace the windows of " Moon, 

 Boys, and Graves." " Surely I know that face,' said Major Matton to 

 his friend. Colonel Guildford; " I cannot be deceived ; and yet, if so, 

 he is strangely altered." The gentleman who elicited this observation, 

 seeing that he had caught the eye of two of the party, stopped, looked 

 up with a smile, any thing but pleasing, and bowed twice, in so lowly a 

 manner, that even in these days of nods and abruptness his salutation at- 

 tracted the attention of several of the ordinary passengers ; the greeting 

 was acknowledged with so marked a coldness, that the person went on 

 his way, not, however, without repeating the bow, as if it had met with 

 the warmest reception. 



" If a masked and draped figure were to rise out of the waves, and 

 salute me after that fashion, I could swear to it." 



" And so could I," replied his friend ; " nothing can change that 

 man. One would have thought that his Indian experience would have 

 gone some way towards breaking the neck of his lies and flatteries ; they 

 were too gross even for the East." 



" Pardon me," replied the other, " poor Bearfoot had never tact 

 enough to discover that ; it was not given him to see more than one 

 side of any question. You were at Madras, I believe, when he ar- 

 rived ?" 



" I was, and he was a standing jest among us for some time, though 

 we discovered at last, that he was malignant and treacherous as a tiger. . 

 We had a good deal of leisui'e, and some five or six used to enter into a 

 combination, to make the creature contradict himself twenty times a 

 day. Lord Goydon, poor fellow ! would meet him with — ' Good 

 morrow, Bearfoot; I think we shall have rain to-day.' — ' Your lordship 

 is always correct ; and, with all due deference, I had just formed the 

 same opinion. I hope your lordship will avoid cold.' At the next turn 

 the colonel would exclaim — ' Ah, Bearfoot ! another of our scorching 

 days ; we shall be cinders soon.' — ' Calcined, colonel, calcined ; I never 



