at is the matter with Miss Smithers?' said the lady abbess, as the
aforesaid Miss Smithers proceeded to go into hysterics of four young
lady power.

'Lor, Miss Smithers, dear,' said the other nine-and-twenty boarders.

'Oh, the man--the man--behind the door!' screamed Miss Smithers.

The lady abbess no sooner heard this appalling cry, than she
retreated to her own bedroom, double-locked the door, and fainted away
comfortably. The boarders, and the teachers, and the servants, fell back
upon the stairs, and upon each other; and never was such a screaming,
and fainting, and struggling beheld. In the midst of the tumult, Mr.
Pickwick emerged from his concealment, and presented himself amongst
them.

'Ladies--dear ladies,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Oh. he says we're dear,' cried the oldest and ugliest teacher. 'Oh, the
wretch!'

'Ladies,' roared Mr. Pickwick, rendered desperate by the danger of his
situation. 'Hear me. I am no robber. I want the lady of the house.'

'Oh, what a ferocious monster!' screamed another teacher. 'He wants Miss
Tomkins.'

Here there was a general scream.

'Ring the alarm bell, somebody!' cried a dozen voices.

'Don't--don't,' shouted Mr. Pickwick. 'Look at me. Do I look like a
robber! My dear ladies--you may bind me hand and leg, or lock me up in a
closet, if you like. Only hear what I have got to say--only hear me.'

'How did you come in our garden?' faltered the housemaid.

'Call the lady of the house, and I'll tell her everything,' said Mr.
Pickwick, exerting his lungs to the utmost pitch. 'Call her--only be
quiet, and call her, and you shall hear everything.'

It might have been Mr. Pickwick's appearance, or it might have been his
manner, or it might have been the temptation--irresistible to a female
mind--of hearing something at present enveloped in mystery, that reduced
the more reasonable portion of the establishment (some four individuals)
to a state of comparative quiet. By them it was proposed, as a test of
Mr. Pickwick's sincerity, that he should immediately submit to personal
restraint; and that gentleman having consented to hold a conference with
Miss Tomkins, from the interior of a closet in which the day boarders
hung their bonnets and sandwich-bags, he at once stepped into it, of
his own accord, and was securely locked in. This revived the others; and
Miss Tomkins having been brought to, and brought down, the conference
began.

'What did you do in my garden, man?' said M