phrase), and that is the great point after all. It was probably with a view to “pleasing the ladies” that Mr. Crane had thought proper to invest capital in half a dozen Horticultural tickets--seeing that his own horticultural tastes were confined to drinking Sherry-cobbler in an arbour, whenever such a privilege was vouchsafed to him, and his knowledge limited to the capability of discriminating between a cabbage and a cauliflower. The weather having been such as we have described it during the first and second _fêtes_--on both which occasions Mr. Crane bewailed the useless expense into which his gallantry had seduced him, with a truly touching degree of pathos--these tickets remained unused until the third and last flower-show, when “the face of all nature looking gay,” and “bright Phoebus” obligingly condescending to “adorn the hills,” the ex-cotton-spinner and his spouse, Harry Coverdale and Alice, together with Arabella Crofton, availed themselves of five of them--Horace D’Almayne quietly pocketing the sixth in a fit of mental (and physical) abstraction. They were to start at a quarter before two, as Mr. Crane always preferred being early on all occasions; but at a quarter before two, when the carriages drew up to the door, Alice was not ready, and moreover it was Alice’s own fault that she was not ready; and thus it fell out. Lord Alfred Courtland played the flute well for so young a man, and an amateur; since he had been in town, a talented professor instructed him in this art, who was an exiled patriot--that is to say, he and several other ardent young men had attempted one fine morning to take their “Fatherland” away from the gentleman in possession, and give it to the Secret-blood-and-bones-united-brother band--the same being a pet name by which they saw fit to call themselves. What they would have done with their fatherland, if they had got it, neither do they, nor does any one else appear to have the least idea; but this difficulty of disposing of their country was fortunately spared them, as their enterprise consisted simply of a stroll along the principal street of their native city, in company with a drum and a little red flag, bearing the cheerful device of a skull and cross-bones, with the motto, “Death to Tyrants!” which stroll continued until they accidentally encountered a company of soldiers, who conveyed them--drum, flag, and all--to the state prison, where they were detained, until it being discovered that they were eating their heads off, the authorities exiled them, to save their keep. Herr Hildebrand Tootletoot-zakoffski, one of this devoted band, had brought his Polish sorrows and his German flute to England, and between them both managed to make a much more comfortable income than tyranny had hitherto allowed him to enjoy under the mildewed institutions of his own blighted country. For the rest he was a mild little man, addicted to conversing on music and patriotism