and cheered him; just the speech for them. But,
after all, I heard from Sir Peter's own bailiff that
he ordered a ton of guano the very year he left.
off his leathers and took to travelling by railway.
I've heard say that his forefathers were terrible
radicals in the old times; were against King
Charles in the oak, and all that. Last year the
workmen were pulling down a party wall of the old
house; they found a curiosity, and Mr. Reginal,
that's his eldest son, who's as fond of a joke as
Sir Peter, comes running to him, crying, 'Father,
we've found the bones of your greatest enemy.'
And, when he came to look, it was a printing-
press, what they used to print songs and speeches
against King Charles or King James, I don't
rightly know which, that had been built up for
fear of the officers finding it. 'For,' says Mr.
Reginal, 'that's the father of the Reform Bills and
Railways and Free Traders.' Sir Peter sticks to
his thorough-bred hacks and his snaffle bridle.
It's a pity he ever gave up the leathers, but he's
a picture still, with his Duke of Wellington face
and short seat, in Rotten-row; better on his
horse than half the young dandies."

This warm sketch of Sir Peter, who has long
been one of my favourite studies, for I look on
him and Sir Whatton Dyke as the last of the
Romans, or, rather, last of the squires, born,
bred, and fashioned in the pre-scientific age, led
me to ask my colloquial friend if he remembered
another of my early objects of admiration, Lord
Battlethorpe, or, properly, Earl Benthorne,
although every one loves to remember him by
his parliamentary title.

"Ah, don't I? wasn't his a pleasant face and
a pleasant way? Why, every man, woman, and
child in Greenshire loved him, in spite of his
awful politics. We are blue, you know—all the
Cranberrys are blue—and the Battlethorpe
family is orange. I mind him as if it was
yesterday, when Parliament was up, riding into
Roddington on market day on a big bay, white-
legged hunter, in his broad-brimmed hat and
blue coat, with gilt buttons, and wide flap buff
waistcoat, white cords, and tops just wrinkled
down a little, not on purpose, but because he
forgot to button them up, showing the silk
stockings between; and, but for that silk stocking,
just like any other of our great grazier
farmers, but they hadn't his pleasant manner.
Lord, what a sacrifice to shut such a trump as
that up in the hot Parliament House! he that
liked gossiping in the market-place, tasting and
blowing samples of wheat, and handling a fat
bullock, and never so happy as when hallooing
the fox-hounds; and he could halloo, too, like
an organ. But he must have been fond of his
book too, for he always had one in his pocket.
Curious his simple ways, for his father, the earl,
was a great gentleman. Never stirred without
his coach and four and outriders, kept up a
house full of servants, and was so stiff, and
grand, and stately, although a kind heart, like all
the Battlethorpes. But when he died he left,
they say, what with elections and open house,
as much as a quarter of a million on the estates.
Lord Battlethorpe, as soon as he came to be
earl, made up his mind to clear the property.
He pensions off the old servants, sells the
carriage horses, gives all the deer away, fills the
park with good Short-horns and Herefords, and
when he wants to go to Roddington, just walks,
or rides with a coat strapped before him, or
drives in an old-fashioned gig in very bad weather.
Once or twice a year, at his shooting parties or
the agricultural meetings, he would do the thing
in style, and bring out the famous old port from
the Battlethorpe cellars. And this way, before
he died, he managed to pay off the whole two
hundred and fifty thousand pounds, and the
present young lord, his nephew, has it clear. Poor
dear man, he was gouty, and he thought he
could starve the gout out; so he took to dining
off a finger biscuit and a cup of coffee and a
cigar, and so we lost him. The gout won't
stand none of that nonsense. I say feed it, and
pour in a stiff glass of brandy and water pretty
often. The poor lost a good friend when he
died, for none deserving ever went away empty-
handed, nor sad either, if he could help it. After,
his brother came next, quite a different style of
man, rather starched he'd been so long at
court. He sold most of the live stock, and lived
mostly in town or at the sea. We knew nothing
of him except at election times; but now he's
gone, and the young earl seems to take after his
uncle, although he does not feature him, and,
lord, what a beautiful lady he's married lately!
it's a pleasure to see them, they're as fond and
good to the poor as Lord Battlethorpe.

"But it's curious, now, that there were two
others of our squires brought up at Battlethorpe
Hall—leastways, one was a real squire, and the
other, though very rich, was more of a farmer's
son—turned out quite different. I remember
how Lord Battlethorpe and Squire George
Rance, and Squire Harrybrow, were all brought
up in the same house, same tutors and
everything; for the old earl was left guardian to
Squire George Rance and young Harrybrow,
and brought them up with the same tutors to
provide for them when Lord Battlethorpe went
to college. Lord Battlethorpe was a great
Parliament man, and wrote in books, and hunted
the hounds almost as well as a huntsman, and
was. a better judge of a Short-horn than most of
the farmers, though he was heir to sixty
thousand a year; and these two young squires—they
ain't young now—rode hard, and drank hard,
but knew nothing above hunting the hounds,
and couldn't say Bo! at an election dinner.
They run through everything—that is, George
Rance has lived on his wits any time this ten
years, after getting rid of a hundred thousand
pounds ready money, and as pretty an estate as
any in Greenshire of ten thousand a year.
Harrybrow—his uncle was a rich skinflint farmer—
was the first gentleman of his family, and he
had the luck to marry a sensible wife before his
estate was quite gone. I don't know whether
you're a married man, sir, but in my notion a
wife is the making or the spoiling of many a
gentleman.

"Talking of edication, you saw that ivy-covered