“La, I could tell you ever so much about ’em,” continues the voluble lady.  “What do you think the Captain has got now?—­a little hunchback fellow—­a little hop-o’-my-thumb creature that he calls a poet—­a little Popish brat!”

“Hush, there are two in the room,” whispers her companion.

“Well, I call him Popish because his name is Pope,” says the lady.  “’Tis only my joking way.  And this little dwarf of a fellow has wrote a pastoral poem—­all about shepherds and shepherdesses, you know.”

“A shepherd should have a little crook,” says my mistress, laughing from her end of the table:  on which Mrs. Steele said, “She did not know, but the Captain brought home this queer little creature when she was in bed with her first boy, and it was a mercy he had come no sooner; and Dick raved about his genus, and was always raving about some nonsense or other.”

“Which of the ‘Tatlers’ do you prefer, Mrs. Steele?” asked Mr. St. John.

“I never read but one, and think it all a pack of rubbish, sir,” says the lady.  “Such stuff about Bickerstaffe, and Distaff, and Quarterstaff, as it all is!  There’s the Captain going on still with the Burgundy—­I know he’ll be tipsy before he stops—­Captain Steele!”

“I drink to your eyes, my dear,” says the Captain, who seemed to think his wife charming, and to receive as genuine all the satiric compliments which Mr. St. John paid her.

All this while the Maid of Honor had been trying to get Mr. Esmond to talk, and no doubt voted him a dull fellow.  For, by some mistake, just as he was going to pop into the vacant place, he was placed far away from Beatrix’s chair, who sat between his Grace and my Lord Ashburnham, and shrugged her lovely white shoulders, and cast a look as if to say, “Pity me,” to her cousin.  My Lord Duke and his young neighbor were presently in a very animated and close conversation.  Mrs. Beatrix could no more help using her eyes than the sun can help shining, and setting those it shines on a-burning.  By the time the first course was done the dinner seemed long to Esmond; by the time the soup came he fancied they must have been hours at table:  and as for the sweets and jellies he thought they never would be done.

At length the ladies rose, Beatrix throwing a Parthian glance at her duke as she retreated; a fresh bottle and glasses were fetched, and toasts were called.  Mr. St. John asked his Grace the Duke of Hamilton and the company to drink to the health of his Grace the Duke of Brandon.  Another lord gave General Webb’s health, “and may he get the command the bravest officer in the world deserves.”  Mr. Webb thanked the company, complimented his aide-de-camp, and fought his famous battle over again.

“Il est fatiguant,” whispers Mr. St. John, “avec sa trompette de Wynendael.”

Captain Steele, who was not of our side, loyally gave the health of the Duke of Marlborough, the greatest general of the age.