THE RESIDENTS 99 



the proceedings. The landlord and James the elderly 

 waiter are bound over by self-interest to extreme 

 discretion. But should you happen to be hanging 

 about in the inner lobby while your horses are putting 

 to, you recognise familiar voices exciting themselves 

 in warm disputation, while a rush of spirituous frag- 

 rance comes to your nostrils when the door is opened 

 for the execution of orders. The best of us may be 

 overtaken under the seductions of good-fellowship, 

 but the presence of Mr. Baggs, churchwarden for the 

 congregation, and of Mr. Garbett, the parish clerk, 

 ought to be a guarantee for the habitual respectability 

 of the proceedings. The general tone of politics 

 among the Oakenhurst bourgeoisie is Conservative, but 

 Knocker the coachbuilder is a red-hot Radical, who 

 never cared to conceal his sympathies with the Com- 

 mune ; and should he get to loggerheads with such 

 fiery spirits as Shortrib the butcher, and Spavin the 

 veterinary surgeon, that would sufficiently explain the 

 animation in his arguments. We have reason to fear, 

 too, that debts of honour will sometimes get awkwardly 

 mixed up with commercial transactions. For not a few 

 of the gentlemen are dead hands at loo and "vanjohn " 

 indeed round games at cards and little suppers are 

 a favourite form of entertainment in their private 

 residences ; while Spavin and the Godwin bailiff are 

 professed betting men, having their books on each 

 meeting from Croydon to Lewes. 



There is a different society altogether of market- 

 days. Then the access to the bar is blocked up with 



