‘Thank you, no—­yes—­no,’ replied Waffles, not wanting to be bothered with it; ‘yet stay,’ continued he, as his eye caught Mr. Sponge, who was still on foot beside his vanquished friend; ‘give it to Mr. What-de-ye-call-’em,’ added he, nodding towards our hero.

‘Sponge,’ observed Tom, in an undertone, giving the brush to his master.

‘Mr. Sponge, will you do me the favour to accept the brush?’ asked Mr. Waffles, advancing with it towards him; adding, ’I am sorry this unlucky bather should have prevented your seeing the end.’

Mr. Sponge was a pretty good judge of brushes, and not a bad one of camphire; but if this one had smelt twice as strong as it did—­indeed, if it had dropped to pieces in his hand, or the moths had flown up in his face, he would have pocketed it, seeing it paved the way to what he wanted—­an introduction.

‘I’m very much obliged, I’m sure,’ observed he, advancing to take it—­’very much obliged, indeed; been an extremely good run, and fast.’

‘Very fair—­very fair,’ observed Mr. Waffles, as though it were nothing in their way; ’seven miles in twenty minutes, I suppose, or something of that sort.’

‘One-and-twenty,’ interposed Tom, with a laudable anxiety for accuracy.

‘Ah! one-and-twenty,’ rejoined Mr. Waffles.  ’I thought it would be somewhere thereabouts.  Well, I suppose we’ve all had enough,’ added he, ’may as well go home and have some luncheon, and then a game at billiards, or rackets, or something.  How’s the old water-rat?’ added he, turning to Thornton, who was now busy emptying his cap and mopping the velvet.

The water-rat was as well as could be expected, but did not quite like the new aspect of affairs.  He saw that Mr. Sponge was a first-rate horseman, and also knew that nothing ingratiated one man with another so much as skill and boldness in the field.  It was by that means, indeed, that he had established himself in Mr. Waffles’ good graces—­an ingratiation that had been pretty serviceable to him, both in the way of meat, drink, mounting, and money.  Had Mr. Sponge been, like himself, a needy, penniless adventurer, Caingey would have tried to have kept him out by some of those plausible, admonitory hints, that poverty makes men so obnoxious to; but in the case of a rich, flourishing individual, with such an astonishing stud as Leather made him out to have, it was clearly Caingey’s policy to knock under and be subservient to Mr. Sponge also.  Caingey, we should observe, was a bold, reckless rider, never seeming to care for his neck, but he was no match for Mr. Sponge, who had both skill and courage.