Enhances the reader's opinion of Mr. Palethorpe and Miss Sowersoft still higher and higher; and describes an interview which the latter had with Mr. Longstaff respecting our hero.

THE benevolent Mr. Longstaff lost no time after his return home in acquainting Mrs. Clink with the great and innumerable advantages of the situation at Snitterton Lodge, which he had been endeavouring to procure for her son. Nor did he fail very strongly to impress upon her mind how necessary it would be, when Miss Sowersoft should arrive, for her to avoid stickling much about the terms on which Colin was to go; because, if by any mishap she should chance to offend that lady, and thus break off the negotiation, an opportunity would slip through her fingers, which, it was highly probable, no concatenation of fortunate circumstances would ever again throw in her way.

Mrs. Clink's decision not being required before the following morning, she passed the night almost sleeplessly in considering the affair under every point of view that her anxious imagination could suggest. Colin himself, like most other boys, true to the earliest propensity of our nature, preferred a life passed in fields and woods, amongst horses, dogs, and cattle, to that of a dull shop behind a counter; or of any tedious and sickly mechanical trade. So far that was good. What he himself approved, he was most likely to succeed in; and with success in field-craft, he might eventually become a considerable farmer, or raise himself, like Mr. Longstaff, to the stewardship of some large estate. Visions, never to be realised, now rose in vivid distinctness before the mental eye of Mistress Clink. The far-off greatness of her son as a man of business passed in shining glory across the field of her telescope. But when again she reflected that every penny of his fortune remained to be gathered by his own fingers, the glass dropped from her eye,—all became again dark; the very speck of light she had so magnified, disappeared. But sleep came to wrap up all doubts; and she woke on the morrow, resolved that Colin should thus for the first time be launched upon the stream of life.

Early in the afternoon a horse stopped at Mrs. Clink's door, bearing upon his back a very well-fed, self-satisfied, easy-looking man, about forty years of age; and behind him, on a rusty pillion at least three generations old, a lady in black silk gown and bonnet, of no beautiful aspect, and who had passed apparently about eight-and-forty years in this sublunary world. Mistress Clink was at no loss to conjecture at once that in this couple she beheld the future master and mistress of her son Colin. Nor can it be said she was mistaken: the truth being that, after the departure of Mr. Longstaff from Snitterton Lodge on the preceding day, it had occurred to Miss Sowersoft that, instead of taking the chaise-cart, as had been intended, it would be far pleasanter to take the longest-backed horse on the premises, and ride on a pillion behind Palethorpe. In this manner, then, they reached Bramleigh.

While Mr. Palethorpe went down to the alehouse to put up his horse, and refresh himself with anything to be found there which he thought he could relish, Miss Sowersoft was conducted into the house by Fanny; and in a few minutes the desired interview between her and Mistress Clink took place.

Colin was soon after called in to be looked at.

“A nice boy!” observed Miss Sowersoft,—“a fine boy, indeed! Dear! how tall he is of his age! Come here, my boy,” and she drew him towards her, and fixed him between her knees while she stroked his hair over his forehead, and finished off with her hand at the tip of his nose. “And how should you like, my boy, to live with me, and ride on horses, and make hay, and gather up corn in harvest-time, and keep sheep and poultry, and live on all the fat of the land, as we do at Snitterton Lodge?”

“Very much,” replied Colin; “I should have some rare fun there.”

“Rare fun, would you?” repeated Miss Sowersoft, laughing. “Well, that is finely said. We shall see about that, my boy,—we shall see. Then you would like to go back with us, should you?”

“Oh, yes; I 'll go as soon as Fanny has finished my shirts, thank you.”

“And when you get there you will tell me how you like it, won't you?”

“Yes, ma'am,” continued Colin; “mother has taught me always to say what I think. I shall be sure to tell you exactly.”

“What a good mother!” exclaimed Miss Sowersoft.

“I like her better than anybody else in the world,” added Colin.

“What, better than me?” ironically demanded Miss Sowersoft.

“I don't like you at all, I tell you!” he replied, at the same time breaking from her hands; “for I don't know you; and, besides, you are not half so pretty as my mother, nor Fanny either.”

Miss Sowersoft blushed, and looked confused at this bit of truth—for a truth it was, which others would certainly have thought, but not have given utterance to.

“I will teach you your manners, young Impudence, when I get hold of you, or else there are no hazel-twigs in Snitterton plantation!” thought Miss Sowersoft, reversing Colin's system, and keeping that truth all to herself which she ought to have spoken.

“You will take care he is well fed?” remarked Mistress Clink, somewhat in a tone of interrogation, and as though anxious to divert her visitor's thoughts to some other topic.

“As to feeding,” replied Miss Maria, once more verging towards her favourite topic, “I can assure you, ma'am, that the most delicious dinner is set out every day on my table; with a fine, large, rich Yorkshire pudding, the size of one of those floor-stones, good enough, I am sure, for a duke to sit down to. If you were to see the quantities of things that I put into my oven for the men's dinner, you would be astonished. Great bowls full of stewed meat, puddings, pies, and, I am sure, roasted potatoes past counting. Look at Mr. Palethorpe. You saw him. He does no discredit to the farm, I think. And really he is such a clever, good, honest man! He is worth a Jew's eye on that farm, for I never in my life could get any man like him. Then, see what an excellent master he will be for this boy. In five or six years he would be fit to take the best situation that ever could be got for him, and do Sammy a deal of credit, too, for his teaching. And as to his being taken ill, or anything of that kind, we never think of such a thing with us. People often complain of having no appetite, but it requires all that we can do to keep their appetites down. A beautiful bracing air we have off the moor, worth every doctor in Yorkshire; and I really believe it cures more people that are ill than all of them put together.”

This discourse was not lost upon Mistress Clink. That lady looked upon the character of her visiter as a sort of essence of honesty, hospitality, and good-nature; and influenced by the feelings of the moment, she regarded Mr. Longstaff as really a friendly man, Miss Sowersoft as the best of women, and Colin the most fortunate of boys.

Under these circumstances it became no difficult matter for Miss Maria to settle the affair exactly to her own mind; and, under the pretence of instruction in his business, which was never to be given,—of abundance, which he never found,—and of good-nature, which was concentrated wholly upon one individual,—to persuade Mistress Clink to give the services of her boy on the consideration that, in addition to all his other advantages, he should receive twenty-five shillings for the first year, and five shillings additional per year afterwards. This bargain being struck, it was agreed that Colin should be sent over at the earliest convenient time; and Miss Sowersoft took her leave.

In order to save the expense of any slight refreshment at the tavern, Miss Maria called upon her friend the steward, on the pretence of communicating to him the result of her visit. She found that worthy in his dining-room, with Master Chatham Bolinbroke Longstaff—whom he was attempting to drill in the art of oratory,—mounted upon the table, and addressing his father, who was the only individual in the room, as a highly respectable and very numerous audience.

While this was proceeding here, Miss Æneasina Longstaff, in an adjoining room, sat twanging the strings of a harp. On the other side her younger sister, Miss Magota, was spreading cakes of Reeve's water-colours upon sheets of Whatman's paper, and dignifying the combination with the title of drawings: while, above stairs, young Smackerton William Longstaff was acquiring the art of horsemanship on a steed of wood; and the younger Longstaffs were exercising with wooden swords, with a view to future eminence in the army; and, altogether, were making such disturbance in the house as rendered it a perfect Babel.

Into this noisy dwelling did Miss Sowersoft introduce herself; and, after having stood out with great pretended admiration Master Bolinbroke's lesson, eventually succeeded in obtaining a hearing from the too happy parent of all this rising greatness.

Mr. Longstaff congratulated her upon the agreement she had made, but advised her to be very strict with the boy Colin, or in a very short time she would find him a complete nuisance.

“If you do not make something of him, Miss Sowersoft,” said he, “I am afraid he'll turn out one of that sort which a parish would much rather be without than see in it. He has some sense, as I told you yesterday, but that makes him all the more mischievous. Sense is well enough, Miss Sowersoft, where parents have discretion to turn it in the right channel, and direct it to proper ends; but I do conscientiously believe that when a little talent gets amongst poor people it plays the very deuce with them, unless it is directed by somebody who understands much better what is good for them than they can possibly know for themselves. If you do not hold a tight string over that boy Colin, he 'll get the upper hand of you, as sure as your head is on your shoulders.”

“You are right—very right!” exclaimed Miss Maria. “I am sure, if you had actually known how he insulted me this morning to my face, though I was quite a stranger to him, you could not have said anything more true. It was lucky for him that Palethorpe did not hear it, or there would not have been a square inch of white skin left on his back by this time. His mother cannot be any great shakes, I should think, to let him go on so.”

“His mother!” cried Longstaff; “pooh! pooh! Between you and me, Miss Sowersoft,—though it does not do to show everybody what colour you wear towards them,—there is not a person in the world—and I ought not to say it of a woman, but so it is,—there is not a single individual living that I hate more than I do that woman. She created more mischief in my family, and between Mrs. Longstaff and myself, some years ago, than time has been able altogether to repair. I cannot mention the circumstance more particularly, but you may suppose it was no ordinary thing, when I tell you, that though Mrs. Longstaff knows the charge to have been as false as a quicksand; though she has completely exonerated me from it, time after time, when we happened to talk the matter over; yet, if ever she gets the least out of temper, and I say a word to her, she slaps that charge in my face again, as though it were as fresh as yesterday, and as true as Baker's Chronicles.”

“Ay, dear!” sighed Miss Maria, “I feared she was a bad one.”

“She is a bad one,” repeated Longstaff.

“And that lad is worse,” added the lady.

“However, we'll cure him, Mr. Longstaff.” Miss Maria Sowersoft laughed, and the steward laughed likewise as he added, that it would afford him very great pleasure indeed to hear of her success.

This matter being settled so much to their mutual satisfaction, Mr. Longstaff invited his visiter to join Mrs. Longstaff and her daughters, the Misses Laxton and Magota, over a plate of bread and butter, and a glass of port, which were always ready when the lessons of the morning were finished. This invitation, being the main end and scope of her visit, she accepted at once; and after a very comfortable refection, rendered dull only by the absence of Palethorpe, she took her leave. Shortly afterwards Miss Maria might have been seen again upon her pillion; while her companion, mightily refreshed by the relishable drinks he had found at the tavern, trotted off his horse towards home at a round speed, for which everybody, save the landlady of the inn, who had kept his reckoning, was unable to account.