and cordiality of old friendship. While thus he inquired for various absent individuals, and asked, most affectionately, for sundry aunts, and uncles, not forthcoming, a slight incident occurred, which, by its ludicrous turn, served to shorten the long half-hour before dinner. An individual of the party, a Mr, Blake, had, from certain peculiarities of face, obtained in his boyhood the sobriquet of “Shave the wind.” This hatchet-like conformation had with his growth, and perpetuated upon him a nickname, by which alone was he ever spoken of among his friends and acquaintances; the only difference being that, as he came to man’s estate, brevity, that soul of wit, had curtailed the epithet to mere “Shave.” Now, Sir George had been hearing frequent reference made to him, always by this name, heard him ever so addressed, and perceived him to reply to it; so that, when he was himself asked by some one, what sport he had found that day among the woodcocks, he answered at once, with a bow of very grateful acknowledgment, “Excellent, indeed; but entirely owing to where I was placed in the copse; Had it not been for Mr. Shave there”
I need not say that the remainder of his speech, being heard on all sides, became one universal shout of laughter, in which, to do him justice, the excellent Shave himself heartily joined, Scarcely were the sounds of mirth lulled into an apparent calm, when the door opened, and the host and hostess appeared. Mrs. Blake advanced in all the plenitude of her charms, arrayed in crimson satin, sorely injured in its freshness by a patch of grease upon the front, about the same size and shape as the continent of Europe in Arrowsmith’s atlas; a swansdown tippet covered her shoulders; massive bracelets ornamented her wrists; while from her ears descended two Irish diamond earrings, rivaling in magnitude and value the glass pendants of a lustre. Her reception of her guests made ample amends, in warmth and cordiality, for any deficiency of elegance; and, as she disposed her ample proportions upon the sofa, and looked round upon the company, she appeared the very impersonation of hospitality.
After several openings and shuttings of the drawing-room door, accompanied by the appearance of old Simon, the butler, who counted the party at least five times before he was certain that the score was correct, dinner was at length announced. Now came a moment of difficulty, and one which, as testing Mr. Blake’s tact, he would gladly have seen devolve upon some other shoulders; for he well knew that the marshalling a room full of mandarins, blue, green, and yellow, was “cakes and gingerbread,” to ushering a Galway party in to dinner,
First, there was Mr. Miles Bodkin, whose grandfather would have been a lord if Cromwell bad not hanged him one fine morning. Then, Mrs, Mosey Blake’s first husband was promised the title of Kilmacud if it was ever restored, whereas Mrs. French of Knocktumnor’s mother was then at law for a title; and lastly, Mrs. Joe Barke was fourth cousin to Lord Clanricarde, as is or will be every Burke from this to the day of judgment. Now, luckily for her prospects, the lord was alive: and Mr. Blake remembering a very sage adage about “dead lions,” &c., solved the difficulty at once by gracefully tucking the lady