Sponge's pull-devil,
pull-baker coat, his corduroy waistcoat, his Eureka shirt, Angola vest, and
penetrated the very cockles of his heart. He gave her such a series of
smacking kisses as startled her horse and astonished a poacher who
happened to be hid in the adjoining hedge.
Sponge was never so happy in his life. He could have stood on his head, or
been guilty of any sort of extravagance, short of wasting his money. Oh, he
was happy! Oh, he was joyous! He was intoxicated with pleasure. As he eyed
his angelic charmer, her lustrous eyes, her glowing cheeks, her pearly
teeth, the bewitching fulness of her elegant _tournure_, and thought of the
masterly way she rode the run--above all, of the dashing style in which she
charged the mill-race--he felt a something quite different to anything he
had experienced with any of the buxom widows or lackadaisical misses whom
he could just love or not, according to circumstances, among whom his
previous experience had lain. Miss Glitters, he knew, had nothing, and yet
he felt he could not do without her; the puzzlement of his mind was, how
the deuce they should manage matters--'make tongue and buckle meet,' as he
elegantly phrased it.
Pages:
886
887
888
889
890
891
892
893
894
895
896
897
898
899
900
901
902
903
904
905
906
907
908
909
910