he had lived in honor and repute
amongst such of his countrymen as "feel the yoke and abhor the rule of
the Saxon."

For the present, we are, however, less occupied by Tim and his political
opinions than by two guests, who had arrived a couple of days before,
and were now seated at breakfast in that modest apartment called the
best parlor. Two men less like in appearance might not readily be found.
One, thin, fresh-looking, with handsome but haughty features, slightly
stooped, but to all seeming as much from habit as from any debility, was
Lord Culduff; his age might be computed by some reference to the list
of his services, but would have been a puzzling calculation from a mere
inspection of himself. In figure and build, he might be anything
from five-and-thirty to two or three and forty; in face, at a close
inspection, he might have been high up in the sixties.

His companion was a middle-sized, middle-aged man, with a mass of bushy
curly black hair, a round bullet head, wide-set eyes, and a short nose,
of the leonine pattern; his mouth, large and thick-lipped, had all that
mobility that denotes talker and eater: for Mr. Cutbill, civil engineer
and architect, was both garrulous and gourmand, and lived in the happy
enjoyment of being thought excellent company, and a first-rate judge of
a dinner. He was musical too; he played the violoncello with some skill,
and was an associate of various philharmonics, who performed fantasias
and fugues to dreary old ladies and snuffy old bachelors, who found
the amusement an economy that exacted nothing more costly than a little
patience. Among these Tom Cutbill was a man of wit and man of the world.
His career brought him from time to time into contact with persons of
high station and rank, and these he ventilated amongst his set in
the most easy manner, familiarly talking of Beaufort, and Argyle, and
Cleveland, as though they were household words.

It was reported that he had some cleverness as an actor; and he might
have had, for the man treated life as a drama, and was eternally
representing something,--some imaginary character,--till any little
fragment of reality in him had been entirely rubbed out by the process,
and he remained the mere personation of whatever the society he chanced
to be in wanted or demanded of him.

He had been recommended to Lord Culduff's notice by his Lordship's
London agent, who had said, "He knows the scientific part of his
business as well as the