ect Committee, Mr. Michael
Meredith, who might be termed the Man of Mirth, or, if you please, the
Jack Pudding to the company, whose business it was to crack the best
joke, and sing the best song,--he could. Unluckily, however, this
functionary was for the present obliged to absent himself from St.
Ronan's; for, not recollecting that he did not actually wear the
privileged motley of his profession, he had passed some jest upon
Captain MacTurk, which cut so much to the quick, that Mr. Meredith was
fain to go to goat-whey quarters, at some ten miles' distance, and
remain there in a sort of concealment, until the affair should be made
up through the mediation of his brethren of the Committee.

Such were the honest gentlemen who managed the affairs of this rising
settlement, with as much impartiality as could be expected. They were
not indeed without their own secret predilections; for the lawyer and
the soldier privately inclined to the party of the Squire, while the
parson, Mr. Meredith, and Mr. Winterblossom, were more devoted to the
interests of Lady Penelope; so that Doctor Quackleben alone, who
probably recollected that the gentlemen were as liable to stomach
complaints, as the ladies to nervous disorders, seemed the only person
who preserved in word and deed the most rigid neutrality. Nevertheless,
the interests of the establishment being very much at the heart of this
honourable council, and each feeling his own profit, pleasure, or
comfort, in some degree involved, they suffered not their private
affections to interfere with their public duties, but acted, every one
in his own sphere, for the public benefit of the whole community.

FOOTNOTES:

[I-10] The usual expression for a slight encroachment on a neighbour's
property.

[I-11] The said piper was famous at the mystery.

[I-12] Skates are called sketchers in Scotland.

CHAPTER IV.

THE INVITATION.

Thus painters write their names at Co.

PRIOR.

The clamour which attends the removal of dinner from a public room had
subsided; the clatter of plates, and knives and forks--the bustling
tread of awkward boobies of country servants, kicking each other's
shins, and wrangling, as they endeavour to rush out of the door three
abreast--the clash of glasses and tumblers, borne to earth in the
tumult--the shrieks of the landlady--the curses, not loud, but deep, of
the landlord--had all passed away; and those of the company who had
servants, had been