Tyrrell made no reply, but put spurs to his horse. The pattering rain and
the angry heavens soon drowned the last echoes of the receding hoofclang.

For myself, I looked in vain for a tree; not even a shrub was to be
found; the fields lay bare on either side, with no other partition but a
dead hedge, and a deep dyke. "Patientia fit melius," thought I, as Horace
said, and Vincent would say; and in order to divert my thoughts from my
situation, I turned them towards my diplomatic success with Lord Chester.
Presently, for I think scarcely five minutes had elapsed since Tyrrell's
departure, a horseman passed me at a sharp pace; the moon was hid by the
dense cloud, and the night, though not wholly dark, was dim and obscured,
so that I could only catch the outline of the flitting figure. A thrill
of fear crept over me, when I saw that it was enveloped in a horseman's
cloak. I soon rallied--"There are more cloaks in the world than one,"
said I to myself; "besides, even if it be Tyrrell's dodger, as he calls
him, the baronet is better mounted than any highwayman since the days of
Du Val; and is, moreover, strong enough and cunning enough to take
admirable care of himself." With this reflection I dismissed the
occurrence from my thoughts, and once more returned to self-
congratulations upon my own incomparable genius. "I shall now," I
thought, "have well earned my seat in parliament; Dawton will
indisputably be, if not the prime, the principal minister in rank and
influence. He cannot fail to promote me for his own sake, as well as
mine; and when I have once fairly got my legs in St. Stephen's, I shall
soon have my hands in office: 'power,' says some one, 'is a snake that
when it once finds a hole into which it can introduce its head, soon
manages to wriggle in the rest of its body.'" With such meditations I
endeavoured to beguile the time and cheat myself into forgetfulness of
the lameness of my horse, and the dripping wetness of his rider. At last