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The 10:15 train glided from Paddington May 7, 1847. In the leftcompartment of a certain first-class carriage were four passengers;of these two were worth description. The lady had a smooth, white,delicate brow, strongly marked eyebrows, long lashes, eyes thatseemed to change colour, and a good-sized, delicious mouth, withteeth as white as milk. A man could not see her nose for her eyesand mouth; her own sex could, and would have told us some nonsenseabout it. She wore an unpretending grayish dress, buttoned tothe throat with lozenge-shaped buttons, and a Scottish shawl thatagreeably evaded colour. She was like a duck, so tight her plainfeathers fitted her, and there she sat, smooth, snug, and delicious,with a book in her hand and a soupcon of her wrist just visible asshe held it. Her opposite neighbour was what I call a good styleof man, the more to his credit since he belonged to a corporationthat frequently turns out the worst imaginable style of young men.He was a cavalry officer, aged twenty-five. He had a moustache,but not a very repulsive one—not one of those subnasal pigtails onwhich soup is suspended like dew on a shrub; it was short, thick,and black as a coal. His teeth had not yet been turned by tobaccosmoke to the colour of juice; his clothes did not stick to norhang to him; he had an engaging smile, and, what I liked the dogfor, his vanity, which was inordinate, was in its proper place, hisheart, not in his face, jostling mine and other people's who havenone; in a word, he was what one oftener hears of than meets—ayoung gentleman. He was conversing in an animated whisper witha companion, a fellow-officer; they were talking about what it isfar better not to—women. Our friend clearly did not wish to beoverheard; for he cast ever and anon a furtive glance at his fairvis-a-vis and lowered his voice. She seemed completely absorbedin her book, and that reassured him. At last the two soldiers camedown to a whisper (the truth must be told); the one who got downat Slough, and was lost to posterity, bet ten pounds to three thathe who was going down with us to Bath and immortality would notkiss either of the ladies opposite upon the road. "Done, done!" NowI am sorry a man I have hitherto praised should have lent himself,even in a whisper, to such a speculation; "but nobody is wise atall hours," not even when the clock is striking five and twenty,and you are to consider his profession, his good looks, and thetemptation—ten to three.
After Slough the party was reduced to three. At Twylford one ladydropped her handkerchief; Captain Dolignan fell on it like a lamb;two or three words were interchanged on this occasion. At Readingthe Marlborough of our tale made one of the safe investments of thatday; he bought a "Times" and "Punch"—the latter full of steel-penthrusts and woodcuts. Valour and beauty deigned to laugh at someinflamed humbug or other punctured by "Punch." Now laughing togetherthaws our human ice; long before Swindon it was a talking-match;at Swindon who so devoted as Captain Dolignan? He handed them out,he souped them, he tough-c