hatsoever that hour may be), and whose rich
golden hair, curling down his shoulders, was set off by a perfectly new
four-and-ninepenny silk hat, was seen wending his way down Bittlestone
Street, Bittlestone Square, Gray's Inn. The person in question, I need
not say, was Mr. Snob. HE was never late when invited to dine. But to
proceed my narrative:--

Mr. Snob may have flattered himself that he made a sensation as he
strutted down Bittlestone with his richly gilt knobbed cane (and indeed
I vow I saw heads looking at me from Miss Squilsby's, the brass-plated
milliner opposite Raymond Gray's, who has three silver-paper bonnets,
and two fly-blown prints of fashion in the window), yet what was the
emotion produced by my arrival, compared to that which the little street
thrilled, when at five minutes past five the floss-wigged coachman, the
yellow hammer-cloth and flunkeys, the black horses and blazing silver
harness of Mr. Goldmore whirled down the street!

It is a very little street, of very little houses, most of them with
very large brass plates like Miss Squilsby's. Coal-merchants, architects
and surveyors, two surgeons, a solicitor, a dancing-master, and of
course several house-agents, occupy the houses--little two-storeyed
edifices with little stucco porticoes. Goldmore's carriage overtopped
the roofs almost; the first floors might shake hands with Croesus as
he lolled inside; all the windows of those first floors thronged
with children and women in a twinkling. There was Mrs. Hammerly in
curl-papers; Mrs. Saxby with her front awry; Mr. Wriggles peering
through the gauze curtains, holding the while his hot glass of
rum-and-water--in fine, a tremendous commotion in Bittlestone Street, as
the Goldmore carriage drove up to Mr. Raymond Gray's door.

'How kind it is of him to come with BOTH the footmen!' says little Mrs.
Gray, peeping at the vehicle too. The huge domestic, descending from his
perch, gave a rap at the door which almost drove in the building. All
the heads were out; the sun was shining; the very organ-boy paused; the
footman, the coach, and Goldmore's red face and white waistcoat were
blazing in splendour. The herculean plushed one went back to open the
carriage-door.

Raymond Gray opened his--in his shirt-sleeves. He ran up to the
carriage. 'Come in, Goldmore,' says he; 'just in time, my boy. Open
the door, What-d'ye-call'um, and let your master out,'--and
What-d'ye-call'um obeyed mechanically, with a fa