of the style of Louis Quinze, by Le Roy, was eighty; those Sevres vases were a hundred—­mounted, you see, in ormolu, with lily candelabra for ten lights.  The handles,’ continued he, drawing Sponge’s attention to them, ’are very handsome—­composed of satyrs holding festoons of grapes and flowers, which surround the neck of the vase; on the sides are pastoral subjects, painted in the highest style—­nothing can be more beautiful or more chaste.’

‘Nothing,’ assented Sponge.

‘The pictures I should think are most valuable,’ observed Jawleyford.  ’My friend Lord Sparklebury said to me the last time he was here—­he’s now in Italy, increasing his collection—­“Jawleyford, old boy,” said he, for we are very intimate—­just like brothers, in fact; “Jawleyford, old boy, I wonder whether your collection or mine would fetch most money, if they were Christie-&-Manson’d.”  “Oh, your lordship,” said I, “your Guidos, and Ostades, and Poussins, and Velasquez, are not to be surpassed.”  “True,” replied his lordship, “they are fine—­very fine; but you have the Murillos.  I’d like to give you a good round sum,” added he, “to pick out half-a-dozen pictures out of your gallery.”  Do you understand pictures?’ continued Jawleyford, turning short on his friend Sponge.

‘A little,’ replied Sponge, in a tone that might mean either yes or no—­a great deal or nothing at all.

Jawleyford then took him and worked him through his collection—­talked of light and shade, and tone, and depth of colouring, tints, and pencillings; and put Sponge here and there and everywhere to catch the light (or rain, as the case might be); made him convert his hand into an opera-glass, and occasionally put his head between his legs to get an upside-down view—­a feat that Sponge’s equestrian experience made him pretty well up to.  So they looked, and admired, and criticized, till Spigot’s all-important figure came looming up the gallery and announced that luncheon was ready.

‘Bless me!’ exclaimed Jawleyford, pulling a most diminutive Geneva watch, hung with pencils, pistol-keys, and other curiosities, out of his pocket; ’Bless me, who’d have thought it?  One o’clock, I declare!  Well, if this doesn’t prove the value of a gallery on a wet day.  I don’t know what does.  However,’ said he, ’we must tear ourselves away for the present, and go and see what the ladies are about.’

If ever a man may be excused for indulging in luncheon, it certainly is on a pouring wet day (when he eats for occupation), or when he is making love; both which excuses Mr. Sponge had to offer, so he just sat down and ate as heartily as the best of the party, not excepting his host himself, who was an excellent hand at luncheon.

Jawleyford tried to get him back to the gallery after luncheon, but a look from his wife intimated that Sponge was wanted elsewhere, so he quietly saw him carried off to the music-room; and presently the notes of the ’grand piano,’ and full clear voices of his daughters, echoing along the passage, intimated that they were trying what effect music would have upon him.