The whole company were amazed into a silence of some moments: after which there was a general buzz of favourable remark; Captain Cheston shook hands with him, and all the gentlemen pressed forward to be more particularly introduced to Lord Huntingford. "Dear me!" said Aunt Quimby; "to think that I should have been so sociable with a lord--and a real one too--and to think how he drank tea at Billy Fairfowl's in the back parlour, and ate bread and butter just like any other man--and how he saved Jane, and picked up Johnny--I suppose I must not speak to you now, Mr. Smith, for I don't know how to begin calling you my lord. And you don't seem like the same man, now that you can look and talk like other people: and (excuse my saying so) even your dress looks genteeler." "Call me still Mr. Smith, if you choose," replied Lord Huntingford; and, turning to Captain Cheston, he continued--"Under that name I have had opportunities of obtaining much knowledge of your _unique_ and interesting country:--knowledge that will be useful to me all the remainder of my life, and that I could not so well have acquired in my real character." He then explained, that being tired of travelling in Europe, and having an earnest desire to see America thoroughly, and more particularly to become acquainted with the state of society among the middle classes (always the truest samples of national character), he had, on taking his passage in one of the Liverpool packets, given his name as Smith, and put on the appearance of a man in very common life, resolving to preserve his incognito as long as he could. His object being to observe and to listen, and fearing that if he talked much he might inadvertently betray himself, he endeavoured to acquire a habit of taciturnity. As is frequently the case, he rather overdid his assumed character: and was much amused at perceiving himself rated somewhat below mediocrity, and regarded as poor Mr. Smith. "But where is that Baron fellow?" said Mrs. Quimby; "I dare say he has sneaked off and taken the railroad himself, while we were all busy about Lord Smith." "He has--he has!" sobbed Miss Bentley; who in spite of her grief and mortification, had joined the group that surrounded the English nobleman; "and he has run away with my beautiful diamond ring." "Did he steal it from your finger?" asked Aunt Quimby, eagerly; "because if he did, you can send a constable after him." "I shall do no such thing," replied Matilda, tartly; then turning to her mother she added, "It was when we first went to walk by the river side. He took my hand and kissed it, and proposed exchanging rings--and so I let him have it--and he said he did not happen to have any ring of his own about him, but he would give me a magnificent one that had been presented to him by some emperor or king." "Now I think of it," exclaimed Mrs. Bentley, "he never gave me back my gold essence-bottle with the emerald stopper."