Sponge.

'I did,' rejoined Watson. 'I did, I stuck to him to the last. I'd have been
with him now, only he couldn't get a manor at Boulogne, and a keeper was of
no use without one.'

'What, he went to Boulogne, did he?' observed Mr. Sponge.

'Aye, the more's the pity,' replied Watson. 'He was a gentleman, every inch
of him,' he added, with a shake of the head and a sigh, as if recurring to
more prosperous times. 'He was what a gentleman ought to be,' he continued,
'not one of your poor, pryin', inquisitive critturs, what's always fancyin'
themselves cheated. I ordered everything in my department, and paid for it
too; and never had a bill disputed or even commented on. I might have
charged for a ton of powder, and never had nothin' said.'

'Mr. Jawleyford's not likely to find his way to Boulogne, I suppose?'
observed Mr. Sponge.

'Not he!' exclaimed Watson, 'not he!--safe bird--_very_.'

'He's rich, I suppose?' continued Sponge, with an air of indifference.

'Why, _I_ should say he was; though others say he's not,' replied Watson,
cropping the old pony with the dog-whip, as it nearly fell on its nose. 'He
can't fail to be rich, with all his property; though they're desperate
hands for gaddin' about; always off to some waterin'-place or another,
lookin' for husbands, I suppose. I wonder,' he continued, 'that gentlemen
can't settle at home, and amuse themselves with coursin' and shootin'.' Mr.
Watson, like many servants, thinking that the bulk of a gentleman's income
should be spent in promoting the particular sport over which they preside.

With this and similar discourse, they beguiled the short distance between
the station and the Court--a distance, however, that looked considerably
greater after the flying rapidity of the rail. But for these occasional
returns to _terra firma_, people would begin to fancy themselves birds.
After rounding a large but gently swelling hill, over the summit of which
the road, after the fashion of old roads, led, our traveller suddenly
looked down upon the wide vale of Sniperdown, with Jawleyford Court
glittering with a bright open aspect, on a fine, gradual elevation, above
the broad, smoothly gliding river. A clear atmosphere, indicative either of
rain or frost, disclosed a vast tract of wild, flat, ill-cultivated-looking
country to the south, little interrupted by woods or signs of population;
the whole losing itself, as it were, in an indistinct grey outline,
commingling with the