Page:Doctor Thorne.djvu/67

Rh bottle; nevertheless, in the difficulty of the moment, it was well to have any system to go by. But, as misfortune would have it, though the table was covered with bottles, his eye could not catch one. Indeed, his eye at first could catch nothing, for the things swam before him, and the guests all seemed to dance in their chairs.

Up he got, however, and commenced his speech. As he could not follow his preceptor's advice as touching the bottle, he adopted his own crude plan of 'making a mark of some old covey's head,' and therefore looked dead at the doctor.

'Upon my word, I am very much obliged to you, gentlemen and ladies, ladies and gentlemen I should say, for drinking my health, and doing me so much honour, and all that sort of thing. Upon my word I am. Especially to Mr. Baker. I don't mean you, Harry, you're not Mr. Baker.'

'As much as you're Mr. Gresham, Master Frank.'

'But I am not Mr. Gresham; and I don't mean to be for many a long year if I can help it; not at any rate till we have had another coming of age here.'

'Bravo, Frank; and whose will that be?'

'That will be my son, and a very fine lad he will be; and I hope he'll make a better speech than his father. Mr. Baker said I was every inch a Gresham. Well, I hope I am.' Here the countess began to look cold and angry. 'I hope the day will never come when my father won't own me for one.'

'There's no fear, no fear,' said the doctor, who was almost put out of countenance by the orator's intense gaze. The countess looked colder and more angry, and muttered something to herself about a bear-garden.

'Gardez Gresham; eh? Harry! mind that when you're sticking in a gap and I'm coming after you. Well, I am sure I am very much obliged to you for the honour you have all dome me, especially the ladies, who don't do this sort of thing on ordinary occasions. I wish they did; don't you, doctor? And talking of ladies, my aunt and cousins have come all the way from London to hear me make this speech, which certainly is not worth the trouble; but, all the same, I am very much obliged to them.' And he looked round and made a little bow at the countess. 'And so I am to Mr. and Mrs. Jackson, and Mr. and Mrs. and Miss Bateson, and Mr. Baker—I'm not at all obliged to you, Harry—and to Mr. Oriel and Miss Oriel, and to Mr. Umbleby, and to Dr. Thorne, and to Mary—I beg her pardon, I mean Miss Thorne.'

And then he sat down, amid the loud plaudits of the company, and a string of blessings which came from the servants behind him.

After this, the ladies rose and departed. As she went, Lady