hand over the place where they lay. They seemed to warm his old sides.

"Faith, sir," said he, "the bullion's scarcer with me than it used to be,
as is the case with many a good fellow. I won six hundthred of 'em in a
single night, sir, when me kind friend, His Royal Highness the Duke of
Kent, was in Gibralther." And he straightway poured out to Pen a series
of stories regarding the claret drunk, the bets made, the races ridden by
the garrison there, with which he kept the young gentleman amused until
the arrival of their host and his breakfast.

Then it was good to see the Captain's behaviour before the devilled
turkey and the mutton chops! His stories poured forth unceasingly, and
his spirits rose as he chatted to the young men. When he got a bit of
sunshine, the old lazzarone basked in it; he prated about his own affairs
and past splendour, and all the lords, generals, and Lord-Lieutenants he
had ever known. He described the death of his darling Bessie, the late
Mrs. Costigan, and the challenge he had sent to Captain Shanty Clancy, of
the Slashers, for looking rude at Miss Fotheringay as she was on her kyar
in the Phaynix; and then he described how the Captain apologised, gave a
dinner at the Kildare Street, where six of them drank twinty-one bottles
of claret, etc. He announced that to sit with two such noble and generous
young fellows was the happiness and pride of an old soldier's existence;
and having had a second glass of Curacoa, was so happy that he began to
cry. Altogether we should say that the Captain was not a man of much
strength of mind, or a very eligible companion for youth; but there are
worse men, holding much better places in life, and more dishonest, who
have never committed half so many rogueries as he. They walked out, the
Captain holding an arm of each of his dear young friends, and in a
maudlin state of contentment. He winked at one or two tradesmen's shops
where, possibly, he owed a bill, as much as to say, "See the company I'm