In an episode about bear-shooting, I mentioned the Emperor of Russia, poor dear Nicholas, and told how we had once exchanged horses,--mine being more strong-boned, and a weight-carrier; his a light Caucasian mare of purest breed, "the dam of that creature you may see below in the stable now," said I, carelessly. "'Come and see me one of these days, Potts,' said he, in parting; 'come and pa.s.s a week with me at Constantinople.' This was the first intimation he had ever given of his project against Turkey; and when I told it to the Duke of Wellington, his remark was a muttered 'Strange fellow, Potts,--knows everything!'

though he made no reply to me at the time."

It was somewhere about this period that the priest began with what struck me as an attempt to outdo me as a storyteller, an effort I should have treated with the most contemptuous indifference but for the amount of attention bestowed on him by the others. Nor was this all, but actually I perceived that a kind of rivalry was attempted to be established, so that we were pitted directly against each other. Amongst the other self-delusions of such moments was the profound conviction I entertained that I was master of all games of skill and address, superior to Major A. at whist, and able to give Staunton a p.a.w.n and the move at chess. The priest was just as vainglorious. "He'd like to see the man who 'd play him a game of 'spoiled five'"--whatever that was--"or drafts; ay, or, though it was not his pride, a bit of backgammon."

"Done, for fifty pounds; double on the gammon!" cried I.

"Fifty fiddlesticks!" cried he; "where would you or I find as many shillings?"

"What do you mean, sir?" said I, angrily. "Am I to suppose that you doubt my competence to risk such a comtemptible sum, or is it to your own inability alone you would testify?"

A very acrimonious dispute followed, of which I have no clear recollection. I only remember how Hammond was out-and out for the priest, and Oxley too tipsy to take _my_ part with any efficiency. At last--Row arranged I can't say--peace was restored, and the next thing I can recall was listening to Father d.y.k.e giving a long, and of course a most fabulous, history of a ring that he wore on his second finger.

It was given by the Pretender, he said, to his uncle, the celebrated Carmelite monk, Lawrence O'Kelly, who for years bad followed the young prince's fortunes. It was an onyx, with the letters C. E. S. engraved on it. Keldrum took an immense fancy to it; he protested that everything that attached to that unhappy family possessed in his eyes an uncommon interest. "If you have a fancy to take up Potto's wager," said he, laughingly, "I'll give you fifty pounds for your signet ring."

The priest demurred; Hammond interposed; then there was more discussion, now warm, now jocose. Oxley tried to suggest something, which we all laughed at. Keldrum placed the backgammon board meanwhile; but I can give no clear account of what ensued, though I remember that the terms of our wager were committed to writing by Hammond, and signed by Father D. and myself, and in the conditions there figured a certain ring, guaranteed to have belonged to and been worn by his Royal Highness Charles Edward, and a cream-colored horse, equally guaranteed as the produce of a Caucasian mare presented by the late Emperor Nicholas to the present owner. The doc.u.ment was witnessed by all three, Oxley's name written in two letters, and a flourish. After that, I played, and lost!

CHAPTER IV. PLEASANT REFLECTIONS ON AWAKING.

I can recall to this very hour the sensations of headache and misery with which I awoke the morning after this debauch. Backing pain it was, with a sort of tremulous beating all through the brain, as though a small engine had been set to work there, and that piston and boiler and connecting-rod were all banging, fizzing, and vibrating amid my fevered senses. I was, besides, much puzzled to know where I was, and how I had come there. Controversial divinity, genealogy, horse-racing, the peerage, and "double sixes" were dancing a wild cotillon through my brain; and although a waiter more than once cautiously obtruded his head into the room, to see if I were asleep, and as guardedly withdrew it again, I never had energy to speak to him, but lay pa.s.sive and still, waiting till my mind might clear, and the cloud-fog that obscured my faculties might be wafted away.

At last--it was towards evening--the man, possibly becoming alarmed at my protracted lethargy, moved somewhat briskly through the room, and with that amount of noise that showed he meant to arouse me, disturbed chairs and fire-irons indiscriminately.

"Is it late or early?" asked I, faintly.

"Tis near five, sir, and a beautiful evening," said he, drawing nigh, with the air of one disposed for colloquy.

I did n't exactly like to ask where I was, and tried to ascertain the fact by a little circ.u.mlocution. "I suppose," said I, yawning, "for all that is to be done in a place like this, when up, one might just as well stay abed, eh?"

"T is the snuggest place, anyhow," said he, with that peculiar disposition to agree with you so characteristic in an Irish waiter.

"No society?" sighed I.

"No, indeed, sir."

"No theatre?"

"Devil a one, sir."

"No sport?"

"Yesterday was the last of the season, sir; and signs on it, his Lordship and the other gentleman was off immediately after breakfast."

"You mean Lord--Lord--" A mist was clearing slowly away, but I could not yet see clearly.

"Lord Keldrum, sir; a real gentleman every inch of him."

"Oh! yes, to be sure,--a very old friend of mine," muttered I. "And so he's gone, is he?"

"Yes, sir; and the last word he said was about your honor."

"About me,--what was it?"

"Well, indeed, sir," replied the waiter, with a hesitating and confused manner, "I did n't rightly understand it; but as well as I could catch the words, it was something about hoping your honor had more of that wonderful breed of horses the Emperor of Roosia gave you."

"Oh, yes! I understand," said I, stopping him abruptly. "By the way, how is Blondel--that is, my horse--this morning?"

"Well, he looked fresh and hearty, when he went off this morning at daybreak--"

"What do you mean?" cried I, jumping up in my bed. "Went off? where to?"

"With Father d.y.k.e on his back; and a neater hand he could n't wish over him. 'Tim,' says he, to the ostler, as he mounted, 'there's a five-shilling piece for you, for hansel, for I won this baste last night, and you must drink my health and wish me luck with him.'"

I heard no more, but, sinking back into the bed, I covered my face with my hands, overcome with shame and misery. All the mists that had blurred my faculties had now been swept clean away, and the whole history of the previous evening was revealed before me. My stupid folly, my absurd boastfulness, my egregious story-telling,--not to call it worse,--were all there; but, shall I acknowledge it? what pained me not less poignantly was the fact that I ventured to stake the horse I had merely hired, and actually lost him at the play-table.

As soon as I rallied from this state of self-accusation, I set to work to think how I should manage to repossess myself of my beast, my loss of which might be converted into a felony. To follow the priest and ransom Blondel was my first care. Father d.y.k.e would most probably not exact an unreasonable price; he, of course, never believed one word of my nonsensical narrative about Schamyl and the Caucasus, and he 'd not revenge upon Potts sober the follies of Potts tipsy. It is true my purse was a very slender one, but Blondel, to any one unacquainted with his pedigree, could not be a costly animal; fifteen pounds--twenty, certainly--ought to buy what the priest would call "every hair on his tail."

It was now too late in the evening to proceed to execute the measures I had resolved on, and so I determined to lie still and ponder over them.

Dismissing the waiter, with an order to bring me a cup of tea about eight o'clock, I resumed my cogitations. They were not pleasant ones: Potts a byword for the most outrageous and incoherent balderdash and untruth; Potts in the "Hue and Cry;" Potts in the dock; Potts in the pillory; Potts paragraphed in "Punch;" portrait of Potts, price one penny!--these were only a few of the forms in which the descendant of the famous Corsican family of Pozzo di Borgo now presented himself to my imagination.

The courts and quadrangles of Old Trinity ringing with laughter, the coa.r.s.e exaggerations of tasteless scoffers, the jokes and sneers of stupidity, malice, and all uncharitableness, rang in my ears as if I heard them. All possible and impossible versions of the incident pa.s.sed in review before me: my father, driven distracted by impertinent inquiries, cutting me off with a shilling, and then dying of mortification and chagrin; rewards offered for my apprehension; descriptions, not in any way flatteries, of my personal appearance; paragraphs of local papers hinting that the notorious Potts was supposed to have been seen in our neighborhood yesterday, with sly suggestions about looking after stable-doors, &c. I could bear it no longer. I jumped up, and rang the bell violently.

"You know this Father d.y.k.e, waiter? In what part of the country does he live?"

"He's parish priest of Inistioge," said he; "the snuggest place in the whole county."

"How far from this may it be?"

"It's a matter of five-and-forty miles; and by the same token, he said he 'd not draw bridle till he got home to-night, for there was a fair at Grague to-morrow, and if he was n't pleased with the baste he 'd sell him there."

I groaned deeply; for here was a new complication, entirely unlooked for. "You can't possibly mean," gasped I out, "that a respectable clergyman would expose for sale a horse lent to him casually by a friend?" for the thought struck me that this protest of mine should be thus early on record.

The waiter scratched his head and looked confused. Whether another version of the event possessed him, or that my question staggered his convictions, I am unable to say; but he made no reply. "It is true,"

continued I, in the same strain, "that I met his reverence last night for the first time. My friend Lord Keldrum made us acquainted; but seeing him received at my n.o.ble friend's board, I naturally felt, and said to myself, 'The man Keldrum admits to his table is the equal of any one.' Could anything be more reasonable than that?"

"No, indeed, sir; nothing," said the waiter, obsequiously.

"Well, then," resumed I, "some day or other it may chance that you will be called on to remember and recall this conversation between us; if so, it will be important that you should have a clear and distinct memory of the fact that when I awoke in the morning, and asked for my horse, the answer you made me was--What was the answer you made me?"

"The answer I med was this," said the fellow, st.u.r.dily, and with an effrontery I can never forget,--"the answer I med was, that the man that won him took him away."

"You're an insolent scoundrel," cried I, boiling over with pa.s.sion, "and if you don't ask pardon for this outrage on your knees, I 'll include you in the indictment for conspiracy."

So far from proceeding to the penitential act I proposed, the fellow grinned from ear to ear, and left the room. It was a long time before I could recover my wonted calm and composure. That this rascal's evidence would be fatal to me if the question ever came to trial, was as clear as noonday; not less clear was it that he knew this himself.

"I must go back at once to town," thought I. "I will surrender myself to the law. If a compromise be impossible, I will perish at the stake."

I forgot there was no stake; but there was wool-carding, and oak.u.m-picking, and wheel-treading, and oyster-sh.e.l.l pounding, and other small plays of this nature, infinitely more degrading to humanity than all the cruelties of our barbarous ancestors.