ME. SPONGE'S SPOUTING TOUR. 237 



CHAPTER XXXV. 



MR. PUFFINGTON'S DOMESTIC ARRANGEMENTS. 



Perhaps it was fortunate that Mr. Bragg did take the kennel 

 management upon himself, or there is no saying but what with 

 that and the house department, coupled with the usual fussyness 

 of a bachelor, the Sponge visit might have proved too much for 

 our master. The notice of the intended visit was short ; and there 

 were invitations to send out, and answers to get, bed-rooms to pre- 

 pare, and culinary arrangements to make — arrangements that 

 people in town, with all their tradespeople at their elbows, can 

 have no idea of the difficulty of effecting in the country. Mr. 

 Puffington was fully employed. 



In addition to the parties mentioned as asked in his note to Lord 

 Scamperdale, viz., "Washball, Charley Slapp, and Lumpleg, were 

 Parson Blossomnose, and Mr. Fossick of the Flat Hat Hunt, who 

 declined — Mr. Crane, of Crane Hall, and Captain Guano, late of 

 that noble corps the Spotted Horse Marines, and others who 

 accepted. Mr. Spraggon was a sort of volunteer, at all events an 

 undesired guest, unless his lordship accompanied him. It so 

 happened that the least wanted guest was the first to arrive on the 

 all important day. 



Lord Scamperdale, knowing our friend Jack was not over 

 affluent, had no idea of spoiling him by too much luxury, and as 

 the railway would serve a certain distance in the line of Hanby 

 House, he despatched Jack to the Over-shoes-over-boots station 

 with the dog-cart, and told him he would be sure to find a 'bus, or 

 to get some sort of conveyance at the Squandercash station to 

 take him up to Puffington's ; at all events, his lordship added to 

 himself, " If he doesn't, it'll do him no harm to walk, and he can 

 easily get a boy to carry his bag." 



The latter was the case ; for though the station-master assured 

 Jack, on his arrival at Squandercash, that there was a 'bus, or a 

 mail gig, or a something to every other train, there was nothing 

 in connection with the one that brought him, nor would he under- 

 take to leave his carpet bag at Hanby House before breakfast- 

 time the next morning. 



Jack was highly enraged, and proceeded to squint his eye inside 

 out, and abuse all railways, and chairmen, and directors, and 

 secretaries, and clerks, and porters, vowing that railways were the 

 greatest nuisances under the sun — that they were a perfect impedi- 

 ment instead of a facility to travelling — and declared that formerly 



