"Well, I can return the compliment; for a blue, with chased buttons and
silk lining, you beat anything I ever had the honour of meeting. But I
suppose, as you are here, you are not the Cornet now?"

"Alas! no."

"May I ask why?"

"Certainly. His scoundrel of a valet disgraced his master's cloth and me
at the same time. The villain went to the Lowther Arcade--took me with him
by force. Fancy my agony; literally accessory to handing ices to
milliners' apprentices and staymakers; and when the wretch commenced
quadrilling it, he dos-a-dos'd me up against a fat soap-boiler's wife, in
filthy three-turned-and-dyed common satin."

"Scoundrel!"

"Rascal! But he was discovered--he reeled home drunk. _I_, that is, as
it's known, _we_ make the men. The Cornet saw him, and thrashed him
soundly with a three-foot Crowther."

"That must have been delightful to your feelings."

"Not very."

"Why not? revenge is sweet."

"So it is; but as the Cornet forgot to order him to take me off, I got the
worst of the drubbing. I was dreadfully cut about. Two buttons fearfully
lacerated--nothing but the shanks left."