to our
neighbourhood--neighbourhood of Ashford--and take a run about our
place,--we shall be glad for you to stop as long as you like.'

I thank Mr. Chestle warmly, and shake hands. I think I am in a happy
dream. I waltz with the eldest Miss Larkins once again. She says I
waltz so well! I go home in a state of unspeakable bliss, and waltz in
imagination, all night long, with my arm round the blue waist of my dear
divinity. For some days afterwards, I am lost in rapturous reflections;
but I neither see her in the street, nor when I call. I am imperfectly
consoled for this disappointment by the sacred pledge, the perished
flower.

'Trotwood,' says Agnes, one day after dinner. 'Who do you think is going
to be married tomorrow? Someone you admire.'

'Not you, I suppose, Agnes?'

'Not me!' raising her cheerful face from the music she is copying. 'Do
you hear him, Papa?--The eldest Miss Larkins.'

'To--to Captain Bailey?' I have just enough power to ask.

'No; to no Captain. To Mr. Chestle, a hop-grower.'

I am terribly dejected for about a week or two. I take off my ring, I
wear my worst clothes, I use no bear's grease, and I frequently lament
over the late Miss Larkins's faded flower. Being, by that time, rather
tired of this kind of life, and having received new provocation from
the butcher, I throw the flower away, go out with the butcher, and
gloriously defeat him.

This, and the resumption of my ring, as well as of the bear's grease
in moderation, are the last marks I can discern, now, in my progress to
seventeen.

CHAPTER 19. I LOOK ABOUT ME, AND MAKE A DISCOVERY

I am doubtful whether I was at heart glad or sorry, when my school-days
drew to an end, and the time came for my leaving Doctor Strong's. I had
been very happy there, I had a great attachment for the Doctor, and I
was eminent and distinguished in that little world. For these reasons
I was sorry to go; but for other reasons, unsubstantial enough, I
was glad. Misty ideas of being a young man at my own disposal, of
the importance attaching to a young man at his own disposal, of the
wonderful things to be seen and done by that magnificent animal, and the
wonderful effects he could not fail to make upon society, lured me away.
So powerful were these visionary considerations in my boyish mind, that
I seem, according to my present way of thinking, to have left school
without natural regret. The separation has not made the impression on
me, that o