"Just a bachelor's chop," said the earl; "for there's nobody at home but myself." Whereupon Dr Gruffen had come in coloured trousers,--and had never again been asked to dine at Guestwick Manor.

All this Vickers knew well; and now his lordship had brought young Eames home to dine with him with his clothes all hanging about him in a manner which Vickers declared in the servants' hall wasn't more than half decent.

Therefore, they all knew that something very particular must have happened.

"It's some trouble about the bull, I know," said Vickers;--"but bless you, the bull couldn't have tore his things in that way!" Eames wrote his note, in which he told his mother that he had had an adventure with Lord De Guest, and that his lordship had insisted on bringing him home to dinner.

"I have torn my trousers all to pieces," he added in a postscript, "and have lost my hat.