commissions, pressed upon them. The newest fashions were promised to be
brought down, and the village milliner looked forward to a glorious
triumph over all her rivals in the trade about the country. The happy
pair were on the pinnacle of provincial glory; _he_ was expected to
return with the true state of foreign affairs, and the nation, from the
intercourse he would enjoy with the peer; _she_ was expected to
import news of operas, plays, music, novels, writers, balls, routs,
drawing-rooms and dresses, from her intercourse with the peeress.

In all the pleasure to which they looked _forward_ there was but
one _draw-back_, viz. a most extraordinary dread of _London fires_
at night: and this originated in the frequent occurrence in their county
paper of paragraphs headed "_Another alarming conflagration: many
lives lost!_"--put in either to aid the Insurance office, or fill the
paper. As our rustic pair had never visited the metropolis, they did not
know but Leadenhall Street and Hyde Park, Lambeth and Portland Place,
might all be close neighbours; therefore, however distant the different
fires might be, they fancied they all occurred nearly in the same place;
and from the time Mr. and Mrs. Flybekins resolved to visit Town,
scarcely a night passed in which they did not start in terror from their
dreams, screaming "Fire, Fire!"

All was hurry and preparation at "the Lodge," until the anticipated
arrival of the "Barnstaple Sociable," one morning at the door, summoned
the ambitious pair, and on the _fourth day_ of their departure
from Devonshire, they were duly set down at the White Horse Cellar, for
road-making had not then received the magic touch of Macadam. The next
day was occupied in searching for, and entering, suitable lodgings; and
the following day, having hired a carriage, which their unpractised eyes
considered most elegant in style and equipment, they sallied forth,