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Mowledy had been member of both these clubs the Doctor could not have accompanied him to either of them, for he was bound not to go beyond the "rules" of the prison in which he was, by a legal fiction, supposed to be incarcerated for debt: though he had recently bought a limited liberty from the marshal or governor of the King's Bench-an officer who was privileged to sell small supplies of light and air, price ten guineas each.

"Well, then, reverend sir," said the Doctor, with lofty courtesy, "you must dine with me. I hear you have no objection to moderate festivity -nay, I will take no refusal; for what says St. Paul? Does he not enjoin the clergy to practise hospitality. Let us obey the teaching of that saint and gentleman. They cook a rump-steak well not far from hence. I beseech you, in Christian brotherhood, to accompany me

thither."

He entered a neat little hotel, where the waiters evidently knew him, and ordered a good dinner, with a bottle of their best port-for the good of the house, he said.

They sat down together, and his heart opened to the good cheer.

"Ah, reverend sir," remarked Dr. Porteous, "there was a time when my larder was always full of old wine and fat venison, and I could have offered you a haunch, with some rare old Madeira worthy of your experienced taste, and which had twice made a voyage to the Indies; now, we must be content with-what you see."

Mr. Mowledy professed himself perfectly satisfied, as indeed he was, and the dinner continued till, by-and-by the wine warming the Doctor into confidence, he resumed

"Yes, reverend sir, I was not always so unlucky as I am now-the sport of fallen fortunes. I remember my brother said to me, 'Bless you, Ned-for he called me Ned-you shan't starve, though I have brought the old place tumbling down about our ears. Father's and mother's money is gone-so is yours, my boy, at Newmarket; but Will Boultbee is just dead in time. Bishop Smyler, Courthope's tutor, will ordain you, and you shall have the family living before the smash comes and the creditors can seize it.'

"Richard had a warm heart, and we drank many bottles of Burgundy, I remember, that night before we parted.

"You'll have to raise money enough, Edward, to pay my debts of honour to the Duke,' continued my brother, and you must buy an annuity for little Zephirine' (Zephirine, Mr. Mowledy, was the greatest operadancer of her day. She married the Polish Prince Walkyrski shortly afterwards), and the rest will be your own. You'll throw me something across the water out of your tithes now and then, Ned, when I'm out of luck, won't you?'

"Of course I agreed to everything, you know, Mr. Mowledy," said the Doctor, his mouth being full of a salad which he had prepared with much attention; "only, unfortunately, I am free to confess that I found it

difficult to remember that I had not four thousand a-year, which was the full income of the living; whereas I had only six hundred, for Sharpe, the money-lender, father of the present Sharpe, bled me woefully, even as the thieves must have bled the traveller whom the good Samaritan found and nourished."

He finished his story, and told another, then another, washing down the reminiscences of the past with draughts more and more copious, till Mr. Mowledy observed, on a meek consultation of his silver watch, thati t was growing late, and with some dexterity turned the conversation back to Madge.

"Ah, to be sure," said the Doctor, condescendingly, as he opened the third bottle of port. "I remember she was christened in the name of Margaret Wyldwyl. I dined with the Duke a few days after, for he was an intimate associate of my brother, and they used to refresh themselves with wine and wager sums of money with each other. I told his Grace that I had had the honour of performing the rite of baptism to a kinswoman of his illustrious family.

"The devil you had!' said the Duke, looking black as thunder. 'Dit, parson' (for I regret to mention his Grace always used profane oaths after dinner), 'if any Scotchwoman is taking any

liberties with my name, I expect you to put a stop to it, or I'll set one of my bishops at you, and strip the gown off your back, by George !'

"I knew that his Grace could keep his word, and would do so if I made him angry, for there were no less than three right reverend fathers of the Church who owed their seats in the Upper House to the Wyldwyl influence; so I held my tongue, of course, and nothing more was said about it. But either the Duke himself, or Lord George-well, we won't talk scandal, for the credit of the cloth. Her name, however, is Margaret Wyldwyl, pronounced Wyvil, as you know."

Mr. Mowledy did not know it, and he said so; whereat the Doctor went off again at score, and gave him much curious information as to the arbitrary pronunciation of English family names. He also promised to send him Margaret Wyldwyl's baptismal register, of which he had preserved an authenticated copy, from respect to the aristocracy; and in due time did so, "to prevent unnecessary scandal or inquiry into such a subject," he wrote, with other well-turned sentences to like effect.

The Curate having thus obtained the object of his visit, rose to go, and the Doctor, with great urbanity, called for the bill. When it came, he asked the curate carelessly to settle it; and on Mr. Mowledy putting down a five-pound note for that purpose, he absently took up the change, saying he would give it to Mr. Mowledy when they got home presently. So the Curate accompanied his rector back to Melina Place. When they got there, and knocked for admittance, an angry head in a mob-cap was thrust from the window, and the shrill voice, which Mr. Mowledy had heard before, rated the Doctor in no measured terms. The Curate's heart was touched to see the poor gentleman so humbled, and he moved away a

little distance, to be out of hearing, while the storm blew over. He waited for some time while coarse taunts and hard invectives fell pelting on the Doctor's head, and when he disappeared with a sudden jerk, as though pulled into the house by a claw, Mr. Mowledy sighed gently over the loss of his small savings, and returned to Wakefield-in-the-Marsh with some pity and even some respect for the castaway.

CHAPTER XIII.

WEDDING-BELLS.

THE Curate having received an authentic copy of the baptismal certificate in due course from Dr. Porteous, called at the "Chequers" with this document in his pocket-book, to assure John Giles that there need be no further obstacle or delay to retard the wedding. He even showed the certificate, in his precise, conscientious way, to John, in proof of the fact. Upon seeing the certificate, John scratched his head and said he would "be danged if he hadn't a peaper loike that there" in the lining of his hat. He had indeed taken it out of his wife's cupboard one day after her death, and put it there because the hat was too large for him. Now he removed it cheerfully for inspection, and the two papers being minutely compared, were found to be identical.

The names of Thomas Brown, batchelor, and Margaret Wyldwyl, spinster, both of this parish, being then duly published in church on three successive Sundays, and nobody seeing any just cause or impediment why they should not be joined in holy matrimony, they were married; and a joyous peal of bells was rung from the church steeple as they walked home through the meadows, attended by a party of bumpkin wellwishers, who dined somewhat uproariously afterwards, being bidden thereto by John Giles with a willing mind. He soon gave the business altogether up to them, being naturally averse to trouble, and glad to have it taken off his hands. But nothing was outwardly changed at the inn. Tom Brown still did his ostler's work as before. There was not much to do. The waggoners mostly brought a truss of hay with them, and some corn and chaff ready mixed in nose-bags. There was only the trough to fill with water every morning, and to take out a bung to let it drain off at night before a fresh supply was put in. Now and then a farmer stopped his cart going or coming back from Dronington market once a week. But farmers' horses are patient cattle, and they seldom required anything beyond a pail, and a handful of clover. The newlymarried pair had an easy life. The "Chequers" had its set of steady customers, who came and went at regular hours. The money they paid was put in the kitchen drawer, a few pence at a time, and when the brewer came he was paid out of it in coppers. They gained enough to live upon and pay the miller, the all-sorts shop, and occasionally the distiller; but

they put nothing by. They had their own poultry, eggs, milk, bacon, pork and vegetables. At Christmas there was an ox killed in the village, and the Wakefield folk divided it among them, paying chiefly in kind or in work for each portion. They had little need of money, and if a hostile army had invaded England, they would have had no harder task than to requisition fifty shillings at Wakefield-in-the-Marsh half of them would certainly have been in pence or farthings.

Madge seemed perfectly reconciled to her lot, if she had ever fancied she had reason to be dissatisfied with it, and at no subsequent period of her life did she ever appear to regret her marriage. Her husband was a clumsy, good-tempered fellow, who did all he could to please her, and she ruled over her household, as women will, in a natural way.

Her health came back, and her figure developed into matronly proportions with such surprising quickness that she acquired a character for great energy and decision among the gossips of the village.

"Thee hasn't been se larng a maykin' up thee moind, Madge Brown," said Mrs. Jinks, the blacksmith's mother, about three months after the wedding. "T' littal strarnger wun't be tu larng upon 'un's rowad, that 'un wun't, so I tells 'ee-now mark moy wurruds."

But Madge happened to be busy hanging out some clothes to dry just then, so she was obliged to walk away; and when she came back made Mrs. Jinks no answer, having to iron an apron ; which work she evidently thought admitted of no delay, for she raked up the fire with a loud clatter. And though Mrs. Jinks, both then and afterwards, showed a female desire to recur to this subject, it so chanced that Madge had always something noisy to do whenever she touched upon it, though Mrs. Jinks was an old friend of hers, and the women liked each other.

"Wal, Madge, ye'll carl me in yere trouble, wun't 'ee, Madge? I be allus there, I be-yunder at the farge wi' Harry. Tummus have unlee far to put that hed ur his'n out o' t' winder und holler. Oi'll cum to 'ee farst as ould legs 'll carr' me-that I wull."

Madge promised to send for her as soon as her experience should be necessary; and Tom Brown also engaged the professional services of a medical man at Dronington. But neither Mrs. Jinks nor the doctor were unfortunately present when the event happened; for it occurred quite unexpectedly, to the extreme increase of the prophetic reputation of Mrs. Jinks, who, hearing with great delight that a man child had been born to Tom Brown, prematurely, and in the night, joyfully exclaimed that she had always foreseen it would be a seven-months' child, and bustled off to boast of her foresight and take her share of the baby, who was like all other babies, before and since, the common property of kindly neighbours.

She found sheepish Tom Brown very proud of his new dignity as a family man, and walking about with his hobnailed shoes off, that "t' mawther and choylde shud get a bit o' sleape," he said, with a rough tenderness. But Mrs. Jinks knew better what they wanted than he; and

neither Tom, nor John Giles, who passed his time in winking over his beer in reply to all inquiries, could safely say their souls were their own for the next ten days, being despotically ruled by Mrs. Jinks. She had unconsciously mastered the theory of personal government so thoroughly, that neither speech nor thought was free under her. She was, as greater personages have been and are, the absolute mistress of an absolute king, who could neither hear, nor see, nor speak, and who was in all respects an infant with no will of his own.

The two men were very glad when Madge came down again with her baby in her arms, and after having been churched in the customary manner, went quietly about her duties.

Mrs. Jinks, however, having fairly earned her renown as a prophetess, was fully determined not to part with it, or to suffer it upon any account to become dimmed by disuse, and, therefore, she now predicted, that whenever a seven-months' child was born, it was a sure sign he would have an impatient temper.

BOOK II.

CHAPTER I.

SWEET WILLIAM.

SOME difference of opinion had arisen at Wakefield-in-the-Marsh, where all the concerns of the parish belonged of right to the gossips, as to the name which should be given to the seven-months' child whose birth has been just recorded. Mr. Joyce was for having him called "Benjamin," and the sexton spoke with some authority in consequence of his connection with the churchyard-a place which few English persons have ever ventured to dissociate from the Church. Mrs. Jinks stood upon precedent, and declared that it had always been the custom at Wakefield, from time immemorial, to call a first child after the name of his grandfather, and John it was, and John "it did ought fur to be." The blacksmith said they might call him "Harry" too, if they liked-a name which he had found good enough for working purposes; and these worthy people had settled the whole thing between them, when Tom Brown, who had not been consulted, suggested it might be as well to ask his wife for her advice upon the subject, and he did so in a shy way peculiar to his uncouth, affectionate nature.

"'Twull be a grand christenin', Madge," said Tom, touzling his shock head of hair, to get rid of some of his superfluous feelings without noise or disturbance.

Mrs. Brown, who was unusually pale and weak after her trouble, smiled faintly, but did not answer. She only cuddled her child closer, and rocked him on her breast by an almost imperceptible movement.

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