Sponge's arrival.
Tom's spirit being roused at hearing the boastings of Mr. Leather, and
thinking, perhaps, his master might have something to say, or thinking,
perhaps, to partake of the eleemosynary drink generally going on in large
houses of public entertainment, had taken up his quarters in the bar of the
'Imperial,' where he was attentively perusing the 'meets' in _Bell's Life_,
reading how the Atherstone met at Gopsall, the Bedale at Hornby, the
Cottesmore at Tilton Wood, and so on, with an industry worthy of a better
cause; for Tom neither knew country, nor places, nor masters, nor hounds,
nor huntsmen, nor anything, though he still felt an interest in reading
where they were going to hunt. Thus he sat with a quick ear, one of the
few undamaged organs of his body, cocked to hear if Tom Towler was asked
for; when a waiter dropping his name from the landing of the staircase to
the hall porter, asking if anybody had seen anything of him, Tom folded up
his paper, put it in his pocket, and passing his hand over the few
straggling bristles yet sticking about his bald head, proceeded, hat in
hand, upstairs to his master's room.
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