r, made out of what used to be
the plate-room, whereof Jack, or whoever was in office, had the possession.
All three rooms were furnished in the roughest, coarsest, homeliest
way--his lordship wishing to keep all the good furniture against he got
married. The sitting-room, or parlour as his lordship called it, had an old
grey drugget for a carpet, an old round black mahogany table on castors,
that the last steward had ejected as too bad for him, four semi-circular
wooden-bottomed walnut smoking-chairs; an old spindle-shanked sideboard,
with very little middle, over which swung a few bookshelves, with the
termination of their green strings surmounted by a couple of foxes'
brushes. Small as the shelves were, they were larger than his lordship
wanted--two books, one for Jack and one for himself, being all they
contained; while the other shelves were filled with hunting-horns, odd
spurs, knots of whipcord, piles of halfpence, lucifer-match boxes,
gun-charges, and such-like miscellaneous articles.

His lordship's fare was as rough as his furniture. He was a great admirer
of tripe, cow-heel, and delicacies of that kind; he had tripe twice a
week--boiled one day, fried another. He was also a great patron of
beefsteaks, which he ate half-raw, with slices of cold onion served in a
saucer with water.

It was a beefsteak-and-batter-pudding day on which the foregoing run took
place; and his lordship and Jack having satisfied nature off their
respective dishes--for they only had vegetables in common--and having
finished off with some very strong Cheshire cheese, wheeled their chairs to
the fire, while Bags the butler cleared the table and placed it between
them. They were dressed in full suits of flaming large-check red-and-yellow
tartans, the tartan of that noble clan the 'Stunners,' with black-and-white
Shetland hose and red slippers. His lordship and Jack had related their
mutual adventures by cross visits to each other's bedrooms while dressing:
and, dinner being announced by the time they were ready, they had fallen
to, and applied themselves diligently to the victuals, and now very
considerately unbuttoned their many-pocketed waistcoats and stuck out their
legs, to give it a fair chance of digesting. They seldom spoke much until
his lordship had had his nap, which he generally took immediately after
dinner; but on this particular night he sat bending forward in his chair,
picking his teeth and looking at his toes, evidently il