W. Pett Ridge

“ You know the kind of tune—one that makes you keep on the move all the time you are listening. About a ball given by Mrs. O'Flaherty, where the fiddler, once started, declined to stop, and the couples kept on with the hop, hop, hop, so that the dance lasted for I forget how long—three weeks, I think. The couples gradually became tired, the tune went slower and slower.
“Mr. Cartwright,” cried my governess, in her high voice, “you ought to be a professional.” ”

“ I replied. “My governess will call at half-past nine to take me home.”
“What an existence we men about town do live, to be sure. Always hurrying from one place to another.”
“If my mother writes to you, Mr. Cartwright,” I said, offering my hand, “you won't fail to come along.” ”

“ Anyway, so far as 1815 is concerned, Blucher, you see, had Grouchy to compete with—this double-six is Grouchy, with thirty-five thousand men—but Blucher outmarched him, came up, and——” He swept the rest of his blue men down with a wave of the hand, and hummed “Rule, Britannia.”
I expressed a wish that he had selected the reds, so that he might have won; but he remarked in a change of mood that anything like success in any game would, by reason of its novelty, have given him serious alarm. ”

“ My governess came in, and he replaced the frame quickly. My governess has sometimes complained that the house is lacking in male society; she took advantage of this opportunity to talk with great vivacity, and, in tones very different from those she uses in addressing me, inquired with affectation concerning the theatres in town, and entertainments generally. Fearing she would try Mr. Cartwright's patience, as she has often tried mine, I endeavoured to detach her ”

“ I wanted to get the opportunity of thinking as hard and as swiftly as possible. There was no time to lose; the station cab stood outside the door, waiting for him I went up, three stairs at a time, and opened the door of my room ”