The speaker was either a very small man, or a large boy dressed in adult clothing--at first sight it was not easy to determine which--till closer observation detected, in the breaking-voice, now hoarse, now shrill, the youthful complexion, and straggling, unformed figure, sufficient evidence that the latter hypothesis was the correct one. His outer boy was encased in a rough, very loose pea-jacket, with preternatural buttons, a. pair of the very “loudest” checked trousers, _real_ Wellington boots, with heels not above three inches high, a shawl round his neck, in regard to which Emily’s perfidious shopman might have been believed, had he declared the colours to be indisputably _fast_; while a velvet travelling-cap, with a bullion tassel, completed his costume. Having wrapped his rug round his lower limbs, and gone through a most elaborate pantomime of making himself comfortable, he condescended to favour his companions with a glance of patronising scrutiny; apparently satisfying himself, by this means, that they were sufficiently respectable to be honoured by his conversation, he turned to Ernest, saying,-- “Fine open weather this, sir--jolly for the hunting--none-of your confounded frosts to-day--regular break up yesterday evening, and been thawing like bricks ever since--fond of hunting, sir?” “I consider it a fine, manly sport, but too dangerous for little boys to be allowed to indulge in,” returned Ernest, drily. Either not detecting, or more probably purposely ignoring, the covert satire of his speech, the fast young gentleman appeared to agree in the sentiment. . “Yes, that’s true enough,” he said; “for instance, I wouldn’t advise this small shaver” (indicating with a motion of the eyelid Hugh, who sat watching him with breathless astonishment) “to trust himself across country outside a horse; but when one has come to--ahem! years of discretion, and learned how to take care of oneself,--the purpose for which divines tell us we are sent into the world,--why the more hunting one gets the jollier, I say.” “Have you ever been out hunting yourself, may I ask?” inquired Ernest, fixing his penetrating glance full on the boy’s countenance; who, despite his fastness, was not, when asked a straightforward question, prepared to tell an actual lie, though to adhere to the exact truth would have made his previous remarks appear singularly inconsistent and uncalled for; accordingly he answered-- “Ar--well--yes--oh! of course I’ve been out hunting--ah--not exactly on horseback, perhaps, but it’s just the same thing, you know;--what a shocking slow train this is, to be sure!----they hardly do their five-and-thirty miles an hour; I shall certainly write to the _Times_ about it, if they don’t mind what they’re at.” During this speech Hugh’s sharp eyes had deciphered the direction on the important writing-desk, containing the jewellery and the incalculable number of £500 notes, and he promulgated the result of his discovery thus:--