ted of a young
gentleman and a young lady on stilts, and Mr Grinder himself, who used
his natural legs for pedestrian purposes and carried at his back a
drum. The public costume of the young people was of the Highland kind,
but the night being damp and cold, the young gentleman wore over his
kilt a man's pea jacket reaching to his ankles, and a glazed hat; the
young lady too was muffled in an old cloth pelisse and had a
handkerchief tied about her head. Their Scotch bonnets, ornamented
with plumes of jet black feathers, Mr Grinder carried on his instrument.

'Bound for the races, I see,' said Mr Grinder coming up out of breath.
'So are we. How are you, Short?' With that they shook hands in a very
friendly manner. The young people being too high up for the ordinary
salutations, saluted Short after their own fashion. The young
gentleman twisted up his right stilt and patted him on the shoulder,
and the young lady rattled her tambourine.

'Practice?' said Short, pointing to the stilts.

'No,' returned Grinder. 'It comes either to walkin' in 'em or carryin'
of 'em, and they like walkin' in 'em best. It's wery pleasant for the
prospects. Which road are you takin'? We go the nighest.'

'Why, the fact is,' said Short, 'that we are going the longest way,
because then we could stop for the night, a mile and a half on. But
three or four mile gained to-night is so many saved to-morrow, and if
you keep on, I think our best way is to do the same.'

'Where's your partner?' inquired Grinder.

'Here he is,' cried Mr Thomas Codlin, presenting his head and face in
the proscenium of the stage, and exhibiting an expression of
countenance not often seen there; 'and he'll see his partner boiled
alive before he'll go on to-night. That's what he says.'

'Well, don't say such things as them, in a spear which is dewoted to
something pleasanter,' urged Short. 'Respect associations, Tommy, even
if you do cut up rough.'

'Rough or smooth,' said Mr Codlin, beating his hand on the little
footboard where Punch, when suddenly struck with the symmetry of his
legs and their capacity for silk stockings, is accustomed to exhibit
them to popular admiration, 'rough or smooth, I won't go further than
the mile and a half to-night. I put up at the Jolly Sandboys and
nowhere else. If you like to come there, come there. If you like to
go on by yourself, go on by yourself, and do without me if you can.'

So saying, Mr Codlin disappeared f