MR. SPONGE'S SPORTING TOUR. 207 



respective huntsmen, Stephen Goodall and Philip Payne, and the 

 aggravation of poor old Griff. Lloyd. 



What between the field and college, young Puffing-ton made 

 the acquaintance of several very dashing young sparks — Lord 

 Firebrand, Lord Mudlark, Lord Dcuccace, Sir Harry Blueun, and 

 others, whom he always spoke of as " Dcuccace," " Blueun," &c, 

 in the easy style that marks the perfect gentleman.* How proud 

 the old people were of him ! How they would sit listening to him, 

 flashing, and telling how Deuceace and he floored a Charley, or 

 Blueun and he pitched a snob out of the boxes into the pit. This 

 was in the old Tom-and- Jerry days, when fisty cuffs were the fashion. 

 One evening, after he [had indulged us with a more than usual 

 dose, and was leaving the room to dress for an eight o'clock dinner 

 at Long's, "Buzzer!" exclaimed the old man, clutching our arm, 

 as the tears started to his eyes, "Buzzer! that's an amaazin 

 instance of a pop'lar man ! " And certainly, if a large acquaint- 

 ance is a criterion of popularity, young Puflington, as he was then 

 called, had his fair share. He once did us the honour — an honour 

 we never shall forget — of walking down Bond-street with us, in 

 the spring-tide of fashion, of a glorious summer's day, when you 

 could not cross Conduit-street under a lapse of a quarter of an 

 hour, and carriages seemed to have come to an interminable lock 

 at the Piccadilly end of the street. In those days great people 

 went about like great people, in handsome hammer-clothed, arms- 

 emblazoned coaches, with plethoric three-corner-hatted coachmen, 

 and gigantic, lace-bedizened, quivering-calved Johnnies, instead 

 of rumbling along like apothecaries in pill-boxes, with a handle 

 inside to let themselves out. Young men, too, dressed as if they 

 were dressed — as if they were got up with some care and attention 

 — instead of wearing the loose, careless, flowing, sack-like garments 

 they do now. 



We remember the day as if it were but yesterday ; Puffington 

 overtook us in Oxford-street, where we were taking our usual 

 sauntering stare into the shop-windows, and instead of shirking or 

 slipping behind our back, he actually ran his arm up to the hilt in 

 ours, and turned us into the middle of the flags, with an " Ah, 

 Buzzer, old boy, what are you doing in this debauched part of the 

 town ? come along with me, and Til show you Life ! " 



So saying he linked arms, and pursuing our course at a proper 

 kill-time sort of pace, we were at length brought up at the end of 

 Vere-street, along which there was a regular rush of carriages, 

 cutting away as if they were going to a fire instead of to a finery 

 chop. 



Many were the smiles, and bows, and nods, and finger kisses, 



* Query, " snob ? " — Printer's Devil. 



