s very soon agog about the couple, until at
the end of a year people began to talk of them separately, she going her
way, and he his. She could not always be on the top of a coach, which was
his throne of happiness.

Plenty of stories are current still of his fame as a four-in-hand
coachman. They say he once drove an Emperor and a King, a Prince
Chancellor and a pair of Field Marshals, and some ladies of the day, from
the metropolis to Richmond Hill in fifty or sixty odd minutes, having the
ground cleared all the way by bell and summons, and only a donkey-cart
and man, and a deaf old woman, to pay for; and went, as you can imagine,
at such a tearing gallop, that those Grand Highnesses had to hold on for
their lives and lost their hats along the road; and a publican at Kew
exhibits one above his bar to the present hour. And Countess Fanny was up
among them, they say. She was equal to it. And some say, that was the
occasion of her meeting the Old Buccaneer.

She met him at Richmond in Surrey we know for certain. It was on Richmond
Hill, where the old King met his Lass. They say Countess Fanny was
parading the hill to behold the splendid view, always admired so much by
foreigners, with their Achs and Hechs! and surrounded by her crowned
courtiers in frogged uniforms and moustachioed like sea-horses, a little
before dinner time, when Kirby passed her, and the Emperor made a remark
on him, for Kirby was a magnificent figure of a man, and used to be
compared to a three-decker entering harbour after a victory. He stood six
feet four, and was broad-shouldered and deep-chested to match, and walked
like a king who has humbled his enemy. You have seen big dogs. And so
Countess Fanny looked round. Kirby was doing the same. But he had turned
right about, and appeared transfixed and like a royal beast angry, with
his wound. If ever there was love at first sight, and a dreadful love,
like a runaway mail-coach in a storm of wind and lightning at black
midnight by the banks of a flooded river, which was formerly our
comparison for terrible situations, it was when those two met.

And, what! you exclaim, Buccaneer Kirby full sixty-five, and Countess
Fanny no more than three and twenty, a young beauty of the world of
fashion, courted by the highest, and she in love with him! Go and gaze at
one of our big ships coming out of an engagement home with all her flags
flying and her crew manning the yards. That will give you an idea of a
young