The Peterses were there from Ramsgate; and Mr., Mrs., and the two Miss Simpkinsons, from Bath, had come to pass a month with the family; and Tom Ingoldsby had brought down his college friend the Honourable Augustus Sucklethumbkin, with his groom and pointers, to take a fortnight's shooting. And then there was Mrs. Ogleton, the rich young widow, with her large black eyes, who, people did say, was setting her cap at the young squire, though Mrs. Botherby did not believe it; and, above all, there was Mademoiselle Pauline; her _femme de chambre_, who "_Mon-Dieu_'d" everything and everybody, and cried "_Quel horreur!_" at Mrs. Botherby's cap. In short, to use the last-named and much respected lady's own expression, the house was "choke-full" to the very attics,--all, save the "oaken chamber," which, as the lieutenant expressed a most magnanimous disregard of ghosts, was forthwith appropriated to his particular accommodation. Mr. Maguire meanwhile was fain to share the apartment of Oliver Dobbs, the squire's own man; a jocular proposal of joint occupancy having been first indignantly rejected by "Mademoiselle," though preferred with the "laste taste in life" of Mr. Barney's most insinuating brogue. * * * * * "Come, Charles, the urn is absolutely getting cold; your breakfast will be quite spoiled: what can have made you so idle?" Such was the morning salutation of Miss Ingoldsby to the _militaire_ as he entered the breakfast-room half an hour after the latest of the party. "A pretty gentleman, truly, to make an appointment with," chimed in Miss Margaret. "What is become of our ramble to the rocks before breakfast?" "Oh! the young men never think of keeping a promise now," said Mrs. Peters, a little ferret-faced woman with underdone eyes. "When I was a young man," said Mr. Peters, "I remember I always made a point of----" "Pray how long ago was that?" asked Mr. Simpkinson from Bath. "Why, sir, when I married Mrs. Peters, I was--let me see--I was----" "Do pray hold your tongue, P., and eat your breakfast!" interrupted his better half, who had a mortal horror of chronological references; "it's very rude to tease people with your family affairs." The lieutenant had by this time taken his seat in silence,--a good-humoured nod, and a glance, half-smiling, half-inquisitive, being the extent of his salutation. Smitten as he was, and in the immediate presence of her who had made so large a hole in his heart, his manner was evidently _distrait_, which the fair Caroline in her secret soul attributed to his being solely occupied by her _agrémens_,--how would she have bridled had she known that they only shared his meditations with a pair of breeches!