Page:Stubbs's Calendar or The Fatal Boots.djvu/92

78 knowing the advantages attendant upon that title, in a watering-place tour.

Captain Stubbs became a great dandy at Cheltenham, Harrowgate, Bath, Leamington, and other places. I was a good whist and billiard player; so much so, that in many of these towns, the people used to refuse, at last, to play with me, knowing how far I was their superior. Fancy, my surprise, about five years after the Portsmouth affair, when strolling one day up the High street, in Leamington, my eyes lighted upon a young man, whom I remembered in a certain butcher's yard, and elsewhere—no other, in fact, than Dobble. He, too, was dressed en militaire, with a frogged coat and spurs; and was walking with a showy-looking, Jewish-faced, black-haired lady, glittering with chains and rings, with a green bonnet, and a bird of Paradise—a lilac shawl, a yellow gown, pink silk stockings, and light-blue shoes. Three children, and a handsome footman, were walking behind her, and the party, not seeing me, entered the Royal Hotel together.

I was known, myself, at the Royal, and calling one