But for aught I know such suspicion may have wronged him.

At all events his disability, whatever it may have been, did not prevent him from making himself very agreeable.
One of our guests upon that same occasion (I must drag the mention of the fact in head and shoulders here, or else I shall forget it), was that extraordinary man, Baron Ward, who was, or perhaps I ought to say at that time had been, prime minister and general administrator to the Duke of Lucca.

Ward had been originally brought from Yorkshire to be an assistant in the ducal stables.

There, doubtless because he knew more about the business than anybody else concerned with it, he soon became chief.

In that capacity he made himself so acceptable to the Duke, that he was taken from the stables to be his highness's personal attendant.