MIDNIGHT REFLECTIONS. 137 



period of waiting at the cover- side, agreeably diversified by 

 the occasional whistle of a musket-bullet from some am- 

 bushed Rockite ; and if you venture to send a horse out 

 to exercise, your groom returns solus, to acquaint you that 

 the quadruped is no more, and that the gentleman who 

 despatched him, sent you his regrets that he was so 

 unlucky as to miss yourself, but, by the assistance of the 

 Blessed Lady for they are a pious and religious race he 

 hoped to be more successful on a future opportunity. 

 Are you fond of a quadrille ? Ascertain before you attempt 

 your first chassez, that the ball-room windows are bricked- 

 "up, and a guard of honour stationed at the door. Are you, 

 unfortunately, a parson ? Insure your life to the uttermost 

 farthing you can raise arrange your affairs perfect your 

 w ill and, if you be curious in posthumous renown, pre- 

 pare your epitaph ; then demand one thirtieth of your 

 tithes you are a dead man to a moral and your heirs, 

 executors, and assigns, secure of opulence within a fort- 

 night. 



All this is pleasant and exciting, but I, as I premised, 

 " have no ambition/' In spite of female persecution, I will 

 return to England (if my life be spared) before the " morrow 

 of All Souls," a day for ever ingrafted on my memory, it 

 being the appointed period that a rascally tailor (when I was 

 in the Blues) allotted for producing my body before his 

 Majesty's Barons of the Exchequer. 



Thus resolved I went to sleep. Next morning my cousin 

 rallied me at breakfast. " I think, Colonel Dwyer, we 

 gave my friend Frank enough of robber narratives last night. 

 Confess, was your couch visited by any of the departed 

 heroes, whom illiberal enactments consign to the gallows, 

 while lesser men are sent in state to Westminster ? Dreamed 

 you 



Of cutting foreign throats ; 

 Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades ?" 



" Ah no," said the Colonel, " our dull tales require the 

 seasoning of good story-telling to render them impressive. 



I wish my quondam acquaintance, Mr. , had been here, 



and, by the shade of Munchausen, he would have embellished 

 a simple burglary to such superlative perfection, that I am 



