Hazlehurst tried to look angry and dignified, but a glance at his friend’s handsome, merry, and, withal, slightly impudent face, disarmed his wrath, and muttering--“Confound you for a stupid, provoking, old humbug”--he burst into a fit of laughter. As soon as he had recovered his gravity, he resumed: “As I said before, I want you to come and make your observations on the cotton spinner, and if your opinion agrees with mine, you must back me up in making a serious remonstrance with the Governor. I know the old gentleman well, and am sure he’ll think twice as much of what I say when he finds that you, a man of the world and a large landed proprietor (that’ll tell with him immensely) look upon the matter in the same light. And now you know my reasons, what do you say?” “Say! what can I say but that I--ahem!--respect the sacred call of friendship, and am prepared to sacrifice myself upon its altar: that’s the correct phraseology, isn’t it? I tell you what, though,” continued Harry gravely, “I make one condition, without which I don’t stir a peg: I’m at your service and that of the cotton spinner, as much as you please; but beyond the requirements of society, I’m not to be expected to concern myself about the women--I’m not to be forced into tête-a-tête drives in pony-chaises, or set to turn over music-books at the piano--I know what all that sort of thing leads to well: is it a bargain?” “Of course it is,” returned Hazlehurst eagerly; “come to please me, and I leave you to please yourself when you get there.” “Then, as Sam Weller says, ‘You may take down the bill, for I’m let to a single gentleman,’” was Coverdale’s reply--and so the affair was settled. CHAPTER IV.--CONTAINS, AMONG OTHER “EXQUISITE” SKETCHES, A PORTRAIT OF A PUPPY (NOT BY LANDSEER). HAZLEHURST Grange was a picturesque old mansion, modernised out of all resemblance to its moated namesake which Tennyson has immortalised, by the addition of gay flower-beds, closely-shaven lawns, judiciously-planted shrubberies, and other appliances of landscape gardening. It was situated about eighteen miles from Coverdale Park, a distance which Harry’s trotting mare, who had grown plump and saucy upon rest and good keep, accomplished, to her owner’s intense satisfaction, in less than five minutes over the hour and a-half. “Pretty fair travelling that, eh, Master Arthur,” he observed, replacing his watch in his waistcoat pocket, “and what I particularly like about it is, that the mare did it all willingly and of her own accord, took well to collar at starting, and kept it up steadily, and in a business-like manner, till her work was done.” “In fact, behaved as utterly unlike a female throughout the whole affair, as if she had belonged to the nobler sex,” returned Hazlehurst, sarcastically. “_Infandum renovare dolorem!_--why will you remind me of my coming trials, and not suffer me to enjoy the pleasures of forgetfulness while I may?” was Coverdale’s desponding rejoinder.