That feat being
accomplished, then came the unloading, and consternation, and huddling of
the tight-laced occupants at the idea of these female _women_ coming
amongst them, and the usual peeping and spying, and eyeing of the
'_creatures_.' 'What impudence!' 'Well, I think!' ''Pon my word!' 'What
next!'--exclamations that were pretty well lost upon the fair objects of
them amid the noise and flutter and confusion of the scene. But hark again!
What's up now?
[Illustration]
'Hooray!' 'hooray!' 'h-o-o-o-ray!' 'Three cheers for the Squire!
H-o-o-o-ray!' Old Puff as we live! The 'amazin' instance of a pop'lar man'
greeted by the Swillingford snobs. The old frost-bitten dandy is flattered
by the cheers, and bows condescendingly ere he alights from the
well-appointed mail phaeton. See how graciously the ladies receive him, as,
having ascended the stairs, he appears among them. 'A man is never too old
to marry' is their maxim.
The cry is still, 'They come! they come!' See at a hand-gallop, with his
bay pony in a white lather, rides Pacey, grinning from ear to ear, with his
red-backed betting-book peeping out of the breast pocket of his brown
cutaway.
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