“I—I—I’ll ask,” replied Paul, glad to escape back to the coach, out of which the Royal Archer’s bull-head was now protruding, anxious to be emancipated. “Who—ho—ho am I to a—a—ask for, pa—pa—per—please?” stuttered Paul, trembling all over with fear and excitement, for he had never seen such a sight except in a show. “Ask for!” muttered Billy, now recollecting for the first time that the fair lady and he were mutually ignorant of each other’s names. “Ask for! What if it should be a hoax?” thought he; “how foolish he would look!” While these thoughts were revolving in Billy’s mind, Big Ben, having thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his cherry-coloured shorts, was contemplating the dismal-looking coach in the disdainful cock-up-nose sort of way that a high-life Johnny looks at what he considers a low-life equipage; wondering, we dare say, who was to be deceived by such a thing. Billy, seeing the case was desperate, resolved to put a bold face on the matter, especially as he remembered his person could not be seen in the glass coach; so, raising his crush hat to his face, he holloaed out, “_I say! is this the Earl of Delacey’s?_” “It is,” replied Ben, with a slight inclination of his gigantic person. “Then, let me out,” demanded Billy of Paul. And this request being complied with, Billy skipped smartly across the flags, and was presently alongside of Ben, whispering up into his now slightly-inclined ear, “_I say, was there a lady arrived here last night from the country?_” (He was going to say “by the coach,” but he checked himself when he got to the word country.) “There was, sir,” replied Ben, relaxing into something like condescension. “Then I’m come to see her,” whispered Billy, with a grin. “Your name, if you please, sir?” replied Ben, still getting up the steam of politeness. “Mr. Pringle—Mr. William Pringle!” replied Billy with firmness. “All right, sir,” replied the blood-red monster, pretending to know more than he did; and, motioning Billy onward into the black and white marble-flagged entrance hall, he was about to shut him in, when Billy, recollecting himself, holloaed, “‘_Ome!_” to his coachman, so that he mightn’t be let in for the two days’ hire. The door then closed, and he was in for an adventure.