I may
as well give in my own words, suppressing divers interruptions,
protestations, and interjections, which, much as they added to its
zest, necessarily rather impeded the course of the narrative, and
postponed its completion till long after I ought to have been back at
luncheon.

Frank had been an only child, and spoiled as only children are in nine
cases out of ten. His father was a peer's second son, and married a
wealthy cotton-spinner's niece for the sake of her money, which money
lasted him about as long as his own constitution. When he died, the
widow was left with ten thousand pounds and the handsome, curly-pated,
mischievous boy. She soon followed her husband. Poor thing, she was
very fond of him, and he had neglected her shamefully. The boy went to
his uncle--the peer, not to his uncle the mill-owner--to be brought
up. Frank was consequently what the world calls a "well-bred one;" his
name was in the _Peerage_, though he had a first cousin once removed
who was but an industrious weaver. The peer, of course, sent him to
Eton.

"Ten thousand pounds," said that judicious relative, "will buy him his
commission. The lad's handsome and clever; he can play whist now
better than my boy's private tutor. By the time his ten thousand's
gone, we'll pick up an heiress for him. 'Gad! how like my poor brother
he is about the eyes!"

So Frank was started in life with a commission in the Light Dragoons,
an extremely good opinion of himself, and as much of his ten thousand
pounds as he had not already anticipated during the one term he spent
at Oxford before he was rusticated. By the way, so many of my
partners, and other young gentlemen with whom I am acquainted, have
gone through this process, that it was many years before I understood
the meaning of the term. For long I understood _rustication_ to be
merely a playful form of expression for "taking a degree;" and I was
the more confirmed in this impression from observing that those who
had experienced this treatment were spoken of with high respect and
approbation by their fellow-collegians.

What odd creatures young men are! I can understand their admiring
prowess in field-sports and athletic pursuits, just as I could
understand one's admiring a statesman, an author, an artist, or a
successful man in any pursuit of life; but why they should think it
creditable to get drunk, to run into debt, to set at defiance all the
rules and regulations enacted for their own bene