We began this chapter by saying that Lord Lackington was not an impassioned letter-writer; and here we are discoursing about Mr. Davis and his habits, as if these topics could possibly have any relation to the noble Viscount's ways; and yet they are connected, for it was precisely to read one of his Lordship's letters to his friend that Beecher was now Grog's guest, seated opposite to him at the fire, in a very humble room of a very humble cottage on the strand of Irish-town. Grog had sought this retirement after the last settling at Newmarket, and had been, in popular phrase, “missing” since that event. “Well, it's a long one, at all events,” said Mr. Davis, as he glanced through his double eyeglass at the letter Beecher handed him,--“so long that I 'll be sworn it had no enclosure. When a man sends the flimsy, he spares you the flourish!” “Right there, Grog. It's all preach and no pay; but read it” And he lighted his cigar, and puffed away. “'Lake of Como, Oct 15 “What 's the old cove about up at Como so late in the season?” “Read it, and you 'll know all,” said the other, sententiously. “'Dear Annesley,--I have been plotting a letter to you these half-dozen weeks; but what with engagements, the heat, and that insurmountable desire to defer whatever can by possibility be put off, all my good intentions have turned out tolerably like some of your own,--pleasant memories, and nothing more. Georgina, too, said--' “Who's Georgina?” “My sister-in-law.” “What's she like,--you never spoke of her?” “Oh, nothing particular. She was a Ludworth; they 're a proud set, but have n't a brass farthing among them.” “Why did he marry her?” “Who knows? He liked her, I believe,” said he, after a pause, as though, failing a good and valid reason, he gave the next best that offered. “'Georgina, too, said she 'd write, but the chances are her own commissions would have been the burden of her letter. She has never forgotten that bargain of Mechlin lace you once procured her, and always speculates on some future exercise of your skill.'” Annesley burst into a hearty laugh, and said,-- “It was amongst the trumpery they gave me at Antwerp for a bill of three hundred and fifty pounds; I got a Rubens,--a real Rubens, of course,--an ebony cabinet, and twenty yards of coffee-colored 'point de Bruxelles,' horrid trash; but no matter, I never paid the bill, and Georgina thought the lace a dead bargain at forty louis.” “So that it squared you both?” said Grog. “Just so, Master Davis. Read on.” “'You must see the utter impossibility of my making any increase to your present allowance--'” “Hang me if I do, then!”