There is no need to give a prolonged detail of the animated
conversation which ensued during the rest of the banquet; a
conversation which would not much edify the reader. And it is scarcely
necessary to say, that all ladies of the _corps de danse_ are not like
Miss Calverley, any more than that all peers resemble that illustrious
member of their order, the late lamented Viscount Colchicum. But there
have been such in our memories who have loved the society of riotous
youth better than the company of men of their own age and rank, and
have given the young ones the precious benefit of their experience and
example; and there have been very respectable men too who have not
objected so much to the kind of entertainment as to the publicity of
it. I am sure, for instance, that our friend Major Pendennis would
have made no sort of objection to join a party of pleasure, provided
that it were _en petit comite_, and that such men as my Lord Steyne
and my Lord Colchicum were of the society. "Give the young men their
pleasures," this worthy guardian said to Pen more than once. "I'm not
one of your straight-laced moralists, but an old man of the world,
begad; and I know that as long as it lasts, young men will be young
men." And there were some young men to whom this estimable philosopher
accorded about seventy years as the proper period for sowing their
wild oats: but they were men of fashion.

Mr. Foker drove his lovely guests home to Brompton in the drag that
night; but he was quite thoughtful and gloomy during the whole of the
little journey from Richmond; neither listening to the jokes of the
friends behind him and on the box by his side, nor enlivening them, as
was his wont, by his own facetious sallies. And when the ladies whom
he had conveyed alighted at the door of their house, and asked then
accomplished coachman whether he would not step in and take some thing
to drink, he declined with so melancholy an air, that they supposed