Great Tattleton was not a fighting place--a serious riot had never occurred within the memory of its 'oldest inhabitant;' yet on that evening quiet people began to feel uneasy; and my particular friend, Miss Croply, had selected it as a fitting occasion for her tea-party. Miss Croply was a maiden lady of some fifty years, and great note among us. She drew dividends at the bank; kept her own establishment, consisting of a maid and a boy; and gave select parties. Moreover, Miss Croply was a Tory after her own fashion. She said there was nothing she hated but Radicals and reformers, for all they wanted was to bring down the respectable people, and maybe break the banks. On these principles, she had been in great fervour for Sommerset Cloudesly; and by way of testifying that his defeat had not broken her spirit, Miss Croply assembled the Priors, myself, and two or three other favoured friends, to tea and crumpets prepared by her own fair hands. These requisites were on the table, and the party assembled in the little drawing-room, all but Lily, whom her mother had left to manage some domestic matter (the old lady was particular at times); but at its conclusion, Lily was to come through the lane, over the fields, and up Miss Croply's garden, to avoid the crowd, and shew the beautiful new bonnet she had received that morning as a present from her aunt. We all knew Lily to be exact; but the hour had come, and not the woman. 'Don't draw that curtain, if you please, Mr Prior; I would not gratify the low creatures by looking out!' said Miss Croply, as shouts louder than ordinary rose from the street, and old Tom stepped to the window. The noise came nearer. It sounded like, 'Miss Prior for ever!' We rushed in a body to the windows. Miss Croply herself drew the curtain. There was a woman borne in a garden-chair, dangerously high, by the most zealous of the Cloudeslyites, while the rest followed in applauding procession, augmented every moment, and Tom's hands went together like the 'crack of doom' as he exclaimed: 'By jingo, it's my own daughter!' Lily it was, in her pretty green gown, white shawl, and gay new bonnet--it was trimmed with pale-green and white: as for her face, it expressed nothing but 'Dear me!' I never saw such philosophy. Out rushed Tom, so did all the men of us, and followed the crowd up the street, and down the lane to the front of Cloudesly's house, where we arrived just in time to see the gallant Sommerset hand Lily from her chair with the air of a man about to kneel. Poor Cloudesly! he was both weak and strong, but a good fellow at heart. 'She wore my colours, and suffered for my sake,' was all he said, as with Lily on his arm he marched back with us to Miss Croply's drawing-room, followed by the crowd, shouting: 'Prior and Cloudesly for ever!' 'Lily, dear, what's the meaning of this?' said old Mrs Prior.