194 MR. SPONGE'S SrORTING TOUR. 



"Indeed, she couldn't say that she thought much of Mr. Sponge 

 herself; his shirts were coarse, so were his pocket-handkerchiefs; 

 and she never yet saw a real gent without a valet." 



Amelia, without any positive intention of giving up Mr. Sponge, 

 at least not until she saw further, had nevertheless got an idea that she 

 was destined for a much higher sphere. Having duly considered all 

 the circumstances of Mr. Spraggon's visit to Jawleyford Court, 

 conned over several mysterious coughs and half-finished sentences he 

 had indulged in, she had about come to the conclusion that the real 

 object of his mission was to negotiate a matrimonial alliance on 

 behalf of Lord Scamperdale. His lordship's constantly expressed 

 intention of getting married, was well calculated to mislead one whose 

 experience of the world was not sufficiently great to know that those 

 men who are always talking about it are the least likely to get mar- 

 ried, just as men who are always talking about buying horses are the 

 men who never do buy them. Be that, however, as it may, Amelia 

 was tolerably easy about Mr. Sponge. If he had money she could 

 take him, if he hadn't, she could let him alone. 



Jawleyford, too, who was more hospitable at a distance, and in 

 imagination than in reality, had had about enough of our friend. 

 Indeed, a man whose talk was of hunting, and his reading " Mogg," 

 was not likely to have much in common with a gentleman of taste 

 and elegance, as our friend set up to be. The delicate inquiry that 

 Mrs. Jawleyford now made, as to " whether he knew Mr. Sponge to 

 be a man of fortune," set him of at a tangent. 



" Me know he's a man of fortune ! I know nothing of his for- 

 tune. You asked him here, not me," exclaimed Jawleyford, stamping 

 furiously. 



" No, my dear," replied Mrs. Jawleyford, mildly; "he asked 

 himself, you know; but I thought, perhaps, you might have said 

 something that " 



"Me say anything!" interrupted Jawleyford; "/never said 

 anything — at least, nothing that any man with a particle of sense 

 would think anything of," continued he, remembering the scene in 

 the billiard-room. " It's one thing to tell a man, if he comes your 

 way, you'll be glad to see him, and another to ask him to come bag 

 and baggage, as this impudent Mr. Sponge has done," added he. 



" Certainly," replied Mrs. Jawleyford, who saw where the shoe 

 was pinching her bear. 



" I wish he was off," observed Jawleyford, after a pause. " He 

 bothers me excessively — 111 try and get rid of him by saying we are 

 going from home." 



" Where can you say we are going to ? " asked Mrs. Jawleyford. 



"Oh, anywhere," replied Jawleyford; "he doesn't know the 

 people about here ; the Tewkesburys, the Woolertons, the Browns, 

 • — anybody." 



