his dripping
and soaked habiliments as sorry a spectacle as need be. In fact, if any
man's external could proclaim want and privation, his did. The signs of
poverty, however, could not screen him from the application of 'Won't
you remember the coachman, sir?' He, with no small difficulty,--for he
was nearly benumbed with cold,--extricated a sixpence from his pocket
and tendered it. The burly driver flung it contemptuously back to him
with insult, and sneeringly asked him how he could dare to seat himself
on the box when he was travelling like a pauper? The traveller never
answered a word; a slight flush, once, indeed, showed how the insult
stung him, but he never uttered a syllable.

"'If I had you down here for five minutes, I 'd teach you as how you
'd set yourself on the box-seat again!' cried coachee, whose passion
seemed only aggravated by the other's submission. Scarcely were the
words spoken, when the dripping traveller began to descend from the
coach. He was soon on the ground, and almost as he touched it the
coachman rushed upon him. It was a hand-to-hand conflict, which,
however, could not have lasted four minutes. The stranger not only
'stopped' every blow of the other, but followed each 'stop' by a
well-sent-in one of his own, dealt with a force that, judging from his
size, seemed miraculous. With closed eyes, a smashed jaw, and a disabled
wrist, the coachman was carried away; while the other, as he drank off
a glass of cold water, simply said, 'If that man wishes to know where to
find me again, tell him to ask for Tom Spring, Crane Alley, Borough
Road!'"

Karstairs followed the anecdote with interest, but, somehow--for he
was not a very brilliant man, though "an excellent officer"--missed the
application. "Capital--excellent--by Jove!" cried he. "I 'd have given a
crown to have seen it."

Layton turned away in half ill-humor.

"And so it was Tom Spring himself?" said the Colonel. "Who 'd have
guessed it?"

Layton made no reply, but began to set the chessmen upon the board at
random.

"Is this another amongst your manifold accomplishments, sir?" asked
Ogden, as he came up to the table.

"I play most games," said Lay ton, carelessly; "but it's only at
billiards that I pretend to any skill."

"I'm a very unworthy antagonist," said Ogden; "but perhaps you will
condescend to a game with me,--at chess, I mean?"

"With pleasure," said Layton, setting the pieces at once. He won the
first move, and just