“Little Alfred Courtland, six feet high, and cultivating whiskers! Wonders will never cease,” resumed Harry, meditatively: “but are you going by this train? Jump in here, man, and I’ll introduce you to my wife. Alice, this is Alfred--I beg his pardon, but I can’t remember he’s not a little boy still--_Lord_ Alfred Courtland. You remember Arthur Hazlehurst, my _fidus Achates_, don’t you, Courtland? my wife is his sister. Tickets! well, here they are. What a suspicious generation these railway officials are! anybody would suppose they had been accustomed to deal with thieves and pickpockets all their lives, instead of honest Englishmen. But I hate the railroads, root and branch, that’s a fact; they’ve ruined the breed of horses in this country.” While Harry ran on in this style, Alice had time to observe her new acquaintance more attentively. He appeared very young, scarcely above nineteen or twenty. His figure, though tall and graceful, was slight and boyish; his head was small and well set on, and his pale, delicate features were shaded by a profusion of fair curling hair; while his bearing and appearance were singularly refined and aristocratic; or, as Harry afterwards observed, “He looked thorough bred, every inch of him.” His expression was good and amiable; but a want of firmness and resolution about the lines of his mouth belied the promise of intellect afforded by his high, smooth brow, and bright, speaking eyes. “And what are you doing with yourself?” inquired Coverdale, after sundry mutual acquaintances had been talked over, and the reminiscences usual between old schoolfellows run through; “are you at either of the universities?” “Yes, I’m a Cantab,” was the reply; “but scarcely more than nominally so, for during my first term I got a tumble into the Cam, boating--dined at Ely in my wet clothes, and was rewarded for my carelessness by an aguish low fever, which I am only now recovering from; so I am ordered to be perfectly idle and amuse myself--a prescription which I am afraid agrees but too well with my tastes and habits.” “And finding country ingredients too mild, you are going to town to try and get a stronger dose there, I suppose?” inquired Harry. “You must be a wizard,” was the reply. “The fact is, my people have wintered abroad, and Chiselborough became so dull the moment the hunting was over, that I found _ennui_ was bringing my ague back again; so holding solemn conclave with the apothecary and my valet, we yesterday decided, _nem. con_., upon a couple of months’ sojourn in the modern Babylon.”