And then she began to consider whether her visit at Pevenshall could not reasonably come to an end very speedily. Florence had asked her friend to come to her for a long time, and as yet Cecil had been little more than ten days in Yorkshire; but then, as Mr. O'Boyneville was unable to leave London, his wife had a very good reason for returning thither. While Cecil was thinking of this, the talk was going on round her, and presently she heard Sir Nugent Evershed talking of Hector Gordon. "He is a splendid fellow," said the Baronet; "I met him in Germany six years ago, and we saw a great deal of each other. He is the kind of man we want in India; the real Napier breed; the man who doesn't know when he is beaten. I was with him in a revolutionary row at Heidelberg. Gad! how he fought! The students wanted to chair him after the squabble; but he wouldn't stand any nonsense of that kind! What a night we made of it afterwards! There was a mad-brained fellow who fancied himself a poet, a brace of transcendentalists, and Gordon and I. I remember our sitting in the balcony of the hotel, drinking Rhine wine and talking meta-physics long after midnight, when the last twinkling light in the queer old city had been extinguished and every roof and steeple stood out clear and sharp in the moonlight. Gordon must be a glorious fellow, if he hasn't degenerated since then. We used to call him the Scottish lion in those days. The girls and old women came to their windows to stare at him as he strode along the miserable pavements, with his long auburn hair flying loose about his neck. I shall be very glad if he comes my way this winter; though I'm sorry they're going to send you fellows to Tralee, Foster." The Pevenshall party were more interested in the costumes they were to wear for the comedy than in the merits of Major Gordon; so no more was said about that gentleman. Sir Nugent was intrusted with the duty of writing to a London costumier who would provide the masculine attire, and he further engaged himself to procure a set of coloured lithographs from which the ladies might choose their dresses. Having accepted these commissions, he departed: but not before he had received an invitation to dinner for the following day from Mr. Lobyer, who came into the morning-room before the party broke up, and who seemed, so far as in him lay, to be amiably disposed towards his visitors and the world in general.