"Egad! Juno's put out," said James, Earl of Carboro', peer of the realm, speaking in a high-pitched voice, and then applying one glove to his very red lips, as if he were uneasy there. "What a magnificent figure, though! She's devilish handsome, she is, egad! It's just as well, perhaps. I won't follow her. I'll go on the pier. Let her come round if she likes, and if she doesn't--why, demme, I don't care if she doesn't--now that--" He smacked his lips, and shook his head, and then drew himself up, rearranging his quaint beaver hat that came down fore and aft, curled up tightly at the sides, and spread out widely at the flat top. He gave his ancient body a bit of a writhe, and then raised his gold eyeglass to gaze at the pier, towards which people seemed to be hastening. "Eh? Egad, why, what's the matter? Somebody gone overboard? I'll go and see. No, I won't; I'll sit down and wait. I shall soon know. It's deuced hot. Those railings are not safe." He settled himself on the first seat on the cliff, and, giving the wide watered-silk ribbon a shake, used his broad and square gold-rimmed eyeglass once more, gazing through it at the long, old-fashioned pier that ran down into the sea, amongst whose piles the bright waves that washed the chalky shore of fashionable Saltinville were playing, while an unusual bustle was observable in the little crowd of loungers that clustered on the long low erection. Meanwhile the Master of the Ceremonies of the fashionable seaside resort honoured of royalty had continued his course towards the pier. The trouble at his house seemed to be forgotten, and in the pursuit of his profession to serve and be observed--gentleman-in-waiting on society--he looked to-day a tall, rather slight man, with nut-brown hair, carefully curled and slightly suggestive of having been grown elsewhere, closely-shaven face of rather careworn aspect, but delicate and refined. He was a decidedly handsome, elderly man, made ridiculous by a mincing dancing-master deportment, an assumed simpering smile, and a costume in the highest fashion of George the Third's day. His hat has been already described, for it was evidently moulded on the same block as my Lord Carboro's, and the rest of the description will do for the costume of both--in fact, with allowances for varieties of colour and tint, for that of most of the gentlemen who flit in and out in the varied scenes of this story of old seaside life.