e was called into the conference, and at his suggestion, it was decided
that we should have out the phaeton, and that I should myself drive
Miss Blake home; a plan which offered no other difficulties than this
one,--namely, that of above thirty horses in my stables, I had not a single
pair which had ever been harnessed.

This, so far from proving the obstacle I deemed it, seemed, on the
contrary, to overwhelm Baby with delight.

"Let's have them. Come, Charley, this will be rare fun; we couldn't have a
team of four, could we?"

"Six, if you like it, my dear coz--only who's to hold them? They're young
thorough-breds,--most of them never backed; some not bitted. In fact, I
know nothing of my stable. I say, Mike, is there anything fit to take out?"

"Yes, sir; there's Miss Wildespin, she's in training, to be sure; but we
can't help that; and the brown colt they call, 'Billy the Bolter,'--they're
the likeliest we have; without your honor would take the two chestnuts we
took up last week; they're raal devils to go; and if the tackle will hold
them, they'll bring you to Mr. Blake's door in forty minutes."

"I vote for the chestnuts," said Baby, slapping her boot with her
horsewhip.

"I move an amendment in favor of Miss Wildespin," said I, doubtfully.

"He'll never do for Galway," sang Baby, laying her whip on my shoulder with
no tender hand; "yet you used to cross the country in good style when you
were here before."

"And might do so again, Baby."

"Ah, no; that vile dragoon seat, with your long stirrup, and your heel
dropped, and your elbow this way, and your head that! How could you ever
screw your horse up to his fence, lifting him along as you came up through
the heavy ground, and with a stroke of your hand sending him pop over, with
his hind-legs well under him?" Here she burst into a fit of laughter at my
look of amazement, as with voice, gesture, and look she actually dramatized
the scene she described.

By the time that I had costumed my fair friend in my dragoon cloak and a
foraging cap, with a gold band around it, which was the extent of muffling
my establishment could muster, a distant noise without apprised us that the
phaeton was approaching. Certainly, the mode in which that equipage came
up to the door might have inspired sentiments of fear in any heart less
steeled against danger than my fair cousin's. The two blood chestnuts (for
it was those Mike harnessed, having a groom's dislike to take a race