Buckram, muttering to himself in apparent calculation, 'standin' at
livery--three-and-sixpence a night, grum, and so on--I wouldn't mind,'
continued he briskly, 'givin' of you twenty pund for 'im--if you'd throw me
back a sov.,' continued he, seeing Mr. Waffles' brow didn't contract into
the frown he expected at having such a sum offered for his
three-hundred-guinea horse.
In the course of an hour, that wonderful invention of modern times,--the
Electric Telegraph--conveyed the satisfactory words 'All right' to our
friend Mr. Sponge, just as he was sitting down to dinner in a certain
sumptuously sanded coffee-room in Conduit Street, who forthwith sealed and
posted the following ready-written letter:
'BANTAM HOTEL, BOND STREET.
'SIR,
'I have been greatly surprised and hurt to hear that you have thought fit
to impeach my integrity, and insinuate that I had taken you in with the
brown horse. Such insinuations touch one in a tender point--one's
self-respect. The bargain, I may remind you, was of your own seeking, and I
told you at the time I knew nothing of the horse, having only ridden him
once, and I also told you where I got him.
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