who could cope with the sea-captain,--a man with a voice as burly and a
face as bold; a man who, if permitted for the nonce by Mrs. Hazeldean,
would kiss all the women no less heartily than the captain kissed them;
and who was, moreover, a taller and a handsomer and a younger man,--all
three great recommendations in the kissing department of a contested
election. Yes, to canvass the borough, and to speak from the window,
Squire Hazeldean would be even more popularly presentable than the
London-bred and accomplished Audley Egerton himself.

The squire, applied to and urged on all sides, at first said bluntly that
he would do anything in reason to serve his brother, but that he did not
like, for his own part, appearing, even in proxy, as a lord's nominee;
and moreover, if he was to be sponsor for his brother, why, he must
promise and vow, in his name, to be stanch and true to the land they
lived by! And how could he tell that Audley, when once he got into the
House, would not forget the land, and then he, William Hazeldean, would
be made a liar, and look like a turncoat!

But these scruples being overruled by the arguments of the gentlemen and
the entreaties of the ladies, who took in the election that intense
interest which those gentle creatures usually do take in all matters of
strife and contest, the squire at length consented to confront the Man
from Baker Street, and went accordingly into the thing with that good
heart and old English spirit with which he went into everything whereon
he had once made up his mind.

The expectations formed of the squire's capacities for popular
electioneering were fully realized. He talked quite as much nonsense as
Captain Dashmore on every subject except the landed interest; there he
was great, for he knew the subject well,--knew it by the instinct that