London is a narrow place to one not caring to be seen.  I could not remain in this creditor-riddled house; I shunned the Parks, the Clubs, and the broad, brighter streets of the West.  Musing on the refreshing change it would be to me to find myself suddenly on board Captain Jasper Welsh’s barque Priscilla, borne away to strange climes and tongues, the world before me, I put on the striding pace which does not invite interruption, and no one but Edbury would have taken the liberty.  I heard his shout.  ‘Halloa!  Richmond.’  He was driving his friend Witlington in his cabriolet.  ’Richmond, my hearty, where the deuce have you been?  I wanted you to dine with me the other night.’

I replied, looking at him steadily, that I wished I had been there.

‘Compendious larks!’ cried he, in the slang of his dog’s day.  ’I say; you’re one at Duke Fitz’s masquerade to-night?  Tell us your toggery.  Hang it, you might go for the Black Prince.  I’m Prince Hal.  Got a headache?  Come to my Club and try my mixture.  Yoicks! it’d make Methuselah and Melchisedec jump up and have a twirl and a fandango.  I say, you’re thick with that little French actress Chastedian jolly little woman! too much to say for herself to suit me.’

He described the style of woman that delighted him—­an ideal English shepherdess of the print-shops, it appeared, and of extremely remote interest to me, I thought at the time.  Eventually I appointed to walk round to his Club, and he touched his horse gently, and bobbed his diminutive henchman behind his smart cabriolet, the admiration of the street.

I found him waiting for me on the steps of his Club, puffing a cigar with all his vigour, in the classic attitude of a trumpeter.  My first words were:  ‘I think I have to accuse you of insulting me.’

‘Insulting you, Richmond!’ he cried, much surprised, holding his cigar in transit.

‘If you insult my father, I make you responsible to me.’

’Insult old Duke Fitz!  I give you my word of honour, Richmond—­why, I like him; I like the old boy.  Wouldn’t hurt him for the world and all Havannah.

What the deuce have you got into your head?  Come in and smoke.’

The mention of his dinner and the Dauphin crazed him with laughter.  He begged me as a man to imagine the scene:  the old Bloated Bourbon of London Wall and Camberwell! an Illustrious Boy!—­drank like a fish!—­ready to show himself to the waiters!  And then with ‘Gee’ and ‘Gaw,’ the marquis spouted out reminiscences of scene, the best ever witnessed!  ’Up starts the Dauphin.  “Damn you, sir! and damn me, sir, if believe you have a spot on your whole body!” And snuffles and puffs—­you should have been there Richmond, I wrote to ask you:  did, upon my life! wanted you there.  Lord! why, you won’t get such fun in a century.  And old Roy! he behaved uncommonly finely:  said capital things, by Jove!  Never saw him shine so; old trump!  Says Dauphin, “My beautiful mother had a longing for strawberries out of season.  I am marked with a strawberry, here.”  Says Roy:  “It is an admirable and roomy site, but as I am not your enemy, sir, I doubt if I shall often have the opportunity to behold it.”  Ha! ha!—­gee!  Richmond, you’ve missed the deucedest good scene ever acted.’