hasty "Good day, Captain!" which, after the first day or two, merged into
a distant bow. Whenever very good-hearted people are rude, and unjustly
so, the rudeness is in the extreme. The squire felt it so irksome to be
less familiar than heretofore with Clifford, that his only remaining
desire was now to drop him altogether; and to this consummation of
acquaintance the gradually cooling salute appeared rapidly approaching.
Meanwhile Clifford, unable to see Lucy, shunned by her father, and
obtaining in answer to all inquiry rude looks from the footman, whom
nothing but the most resolute command over his muscles prevented him from
knocking down, began to feel perhaps, for the first time in his life,
that an equivocal character is at least no equivocal misfortune. To add
to his distress, "the earnings of his previous industry"--we use the
expression cherished by the wise Tomlinson--waxed gradually less and less
beneath the expenses of Bath; and the murmuring voices of his two
comrades began already to reproach their chief for his inglorious
idleness, and to hint at the necessity of a speedy exertion.




CHAPTER XX.

Whackum. Look you there, now! Well, all Europe cannot show a knot
of finer wits and braver gentlemen.

Dingboy. Faith, they are pretty smart men.

SHADWELL: Scourers.

The world of Bath was of a sudden delighted by the intelligence that Lord