and
behoof. He still spent his Sundays at his lodgings; but pretty
Rosamund was not always able to come across when the snow lay deep
along the country roads. Tom began to think less of her again, and
more of his patron and friend; being, as may have already been
gleaned, a youth of impressionable nature, easily moulded by the
character of his associates, although not without a latent firmness
of will which might develop into sterling metal in time, though,
perhaps, not until the admixture of dross had been purged away by
the action of the furnace of trial.

All London was now agog over the return of the victor of Blenheim.
The great Duke of Marlborough had been upon his way home for some
time. In the middle of December he reached London, and took his
seat in the House of Lords; and it was said that early in the next
year there would be a monstrous fine procession from the Tower to
Westminster, in which all the trophies of war would be solemnly
paraded.

Tom was as excited as anybody over all this, and as eager to obtain
sight of the great Duke. Lord Claud had promised that he should not
only see him, but be one of the same company at some fine house
where he would show himself. Tom had often been to grand enough
houses already with his friend; but it seemed to him overmuch to
suppose that he could be introduced into any company of which the
Duke of Marlborough was to be a member.

Lord Claud, however, was not given to vain boasting. The open-house
festivities of Christmas were approaching. He himself had won the
entree to an extraordinary number of fashionable houses; and this
evening here was Tom, come with his patron to a nobleman's
dwelling, standing in the crowd of fashionable grandees, all in a
flutter of excitement to see the hero of the hour at close
quarters.

"Keep your eyes open, Tom; you cannot fail to see him as he passes
through the room. You are lucky in being able to look over the
heads of all the crowd. No tiptoeing lady can intercept your view
even with her towering headdress!"

This was hardly true; for there were ladies whose headdresses were
of such monstrous proportions that the dame of five feet stood
seven feet high, taking the heels of her shoes and the tower on her
head into consideration! But luckily these extravagant follies were
confined only to the few, the majority of the ladies being content
with a headdress of more moderate dimensions.

There was a great buzz of talk going on a