Joint-stock companies were beginning to multiply in the commercial world at this period; and wherever there are many schemes for the investment of public capital there is room for such a man as Horatio Paget--a man who, with the aid of a hired brougham, can inspire confidence in the breast of the least daring speculator.
The Captain came, accompanied as usual by that plastic tool and subaltern, Valentine Hawkehurst, who, being afflicted with a chronic weariness of everything in life, was always eager to abandon any present pursuit in favour of the vaguest contingency, and to shake off the dust of any given locality from his vagabond feet.

Captain Paget and his _protege_ came to London, where a fortunate combination of circumstances threw them in the way of Mr.Sheldon.
The alliance which arose between that gentleman and the Captain opened a fair prospect for the latter.

Mr.Sheldon was interested in the formation of a certain joint-stock company, but had his own reasons for not wishing to be identified with it.

A stalking-horse is by no means a difficult kind of animal to procure in the cattle-fairs of London; but a stalking-horse whose paces are sufficiently showy and imposing--a high-stepper, of thoroughbred appearance, and a mouth sensitively alive to the lightest touch of the curb, easy to ride or drive, warranted neither a kicker nor a bolter--is a quadruped of rare excellence, not to be met with every day.

Just such a stalking-horse was Captain Paget; and Mr.Sheldon lost no time in putting him into action.