day, would have preferred riding if there had
been—seemed to require some strange excess
to compensate for it; and rumours went
through the town, that he shut himself up,
and drank enormously for some days after his
return. But no one was admitted to these
orgies.

One day—they remembered it well afterwards
—the hounds met not far from the town;
and the fox was found in a part of the wild
heath, which was beginning to be enclosed by
a few of the more wealthy towns-people, who
were desirous of building themselves houses
rather more in the country than those they
had hitherto lived in. Among these the
principal was a Mr. Dudgeon, the attorney of
Barford, and the agent for all the county families
about. The firm of Dudgeon had managed
the leases, the marriage settlements, and the
wills, of the neighbourhood for generations.
Mr. Dudgeon's father had the responsibility
of collecting the land-owner's rents just as the
present Mr. Dudgeon had at the time of which
I speak: and as his son and his son's son have
done since. Their business was an hereditary
estate to them; and with something of the old
feudal feeling, was mixed a kind of proud
humility at their position towards the squires
whose family secrets they had mastered, and
the mysteries of whose fortunes and estates
were better known to the Messrs. Dudgeon
than to themselves.

Mr. John Dudgeon had built himself a house
on Wildbury Heath; a mere cottage, as he
called it; but though only two stories high,
it spread out far and wide, and work-people
from Derby had been sent for on purpose to
make the inside as complete as possible. The
gardens too were exquisite in arrangement, if
not very extensive; and not a flower was
grown in them but of the rarest species. It
must have been somewhat of a mortification
to the owner of this dainty place when, on
the day of which I speak, the fox, after a long
race, during which he had described a circle
of many miles, took refuge in the garden; but
Mr. Dudgeon put a good face on the matter
when a gentleman hunter, with the careless
insolence of the squires of those days and
that place, rode across the velvet lawn, and
tapping at the window of the dining-room
with his whip handle, asked permission—no!
that is not it—rather, informed Mr. Dudgeon
of their intention—to enter his garden in a
body, and have the fox unearthed. Mr.
Dudgeon compelled himself to smile assent, with
the grace of a masculine Griselda; and then
he hastily gave orders to have all that the
house afforded of provision set out for luncheon,
guessing rightly enough that six hours'
run would give even homely fare an acceptable
welcome. He bore without wincing the
entrance of the dirty boots into his exquisitely
clean rooms; he only felt grateful for the
care with which Mr. Higgins strode about,
laboriously and noiselessly moving on the tip
of his toes, as he reconnoitred the rooms with
a curious eye.

"I'm going to build a house myself. Dudgeon;
and, upon my word, I don't think I
could take a better model than yours."

"Oh! my poor cottage would be too small
to afford any hints for such a house as you
would wish to build, Mr. Higgins," replied Mr.
Dudgeon, gently rubbing his hands nevertheless
at the compliment.

"Not at all! not at all! Let me see. You
have dining-room, drawing-room"—he
hesitated, and Mr. Dudgeon filled up the blank as
he expected.

"Four sitting-rooms and the bed-rooms.
But allow me to show you over the house. I
confess I took some pains in arranging it, and,
though far smaller than what you would
require, it may nevertheless, afford you some
hints."

So they left the eating gentlemen with
their mouths and their plates quite full, and
the scent of the fox overpowering that of the
hasty rashers of ham; and they carefully
inspected all the ground-floor rooms. Then
Mr. Dudgeon said:

"If you are not tired, Mr. Higgins—it is
rather my hobby, so you must pull me up if
you are—we will go up stairs, and I will show
you my sanctum."

Mr. Dudgeon's sanctum was the centre
room, over the porch, which formed a
balcony, and which was carefully filled with
choice flowers in pots. Inside, there were all
kinds of elegant contrivances for hiding the
real strength of all the boxes and chests
required by the particular nature of Mr.
Dudgeon's business; for although his office
was in Barford, he kept (as he informed Mr.
Higgins) what was the most valuable here,
as being safer than an office which was locked
up and left every night. But, as Mr. Higgins
reminded him with a sly poke in the side,
when next they met, his own house was not
over secure. A fortnight after the gentleman
of the Barford hunt lunched there, Mr.
Dudgeon's strong-box, in his sanctum
upstairs, with the mysterious spring bolt to the
window invented by himself, and the secret
of which was only known to the inventor and
a few of his most intimate friends, to whom
he had proudly shown it;—this strong-box,
containing the collected Christmas rents of
half-a-dozen landlords, (there was then no
bank nearer than Derby,) was rifled; and the
secretly rich Mr. Dudgeon had to stop his
agent in his purchases of paintings by Flemish
artists, because the money was required to
make good the missing rents.

The Dogberries and Verges of those days
were quite incapable of obtaining any clue to
the robber or robbers; and though one or
two vagrants were taken up and brought
before Mr. Dunover and Mr. Higgins, the
magistrates who usually attended in the courtroom
at Barford, there was no evidence
brought against them, and after a couple of