me, as she said, because, as a boy, I once put some snuff into her favourite cup of tea; but such is the irony of fate,' as you would say, and so I have to bolt off at once, without even time to bid my friends a personal adieu. So now, as Mary Jane would say, no more from

"Yours truly,

"S. M.

"P.S.-Will send address, which I don't quite

remember now, as soon as possible."

CHAPTER XI.

MIXED.

TIME went on-things in the City were alternately worse and better-like the fitful changes of a patient's fever. I was still bothered by frequent visits to the brokers, and had to make many a shift to meet the calls upon my now much-reduced exchequer. Old Sands had written me again and again about "Lotos," and at length I resolved to run her at a small country meeting, about thirty miles from Kelvington. Being put into a damp stable, she caught a heavy cold, and when the race came off she was ignominiously beaten and disgraced. Not fit for even plating company, was the verdict of the touts and betting

men.

I instructed Sands to take her home, and

nurse her for the next few months; fortunately, she recovered more rapidly than was expected, and in six weeks was again at gentle exercise.

Sands gave me the best account of the improvement in the two-year colt, which, he said was furnishing splendidly, and entreated me to advise Marshall not to think of running it before the autumn, at the earliest.

My latest accounts from Sydney were somewhat interesting. After so abruptly leaving Chalkcliffe, to run down to Muddleshire, he found himself in a regular hornets' nest. The old lady had evidently relented at the last moment, and left him residuary legatee, burdened with a heap of small legacies and conditions, which, as he called it, were “enough to drive a hedgehog into hysterics." whole fortune was but moderate, consisting, as he expected, chiefly of long penurious savings. There were board and lodging for life for the old favourite cats, seed and sand for the wretched songless canary, and a small pittance for life for the two retainers, who

The

evidently regarded him as a usurper of their legal rights.

Then the doctor considered himself very harshly treated, after so many years' attendance, by receiving as legacy the trifling remembrance of fifty pounds. Then there were the arrangements for the sale of the house and furniture, so that Marshall found himself full of business for some time to come. Of course, as annoyances never come alone, his agent sent him news of the outbreak of disease amongst his favourite herd of cattle; so there seemed but little chance of our soon meeting, unless I could find time to run down and see him in the country.

A week before the Epsom Summer Meeting I again met Fenton, looking as blooming, as flowery, as ever, brimful of importance; and, seizing me most warmly, he asked the all-absorbing question, "Who will win the Derby?"

"Come, old friend, out with it!" said he, "which is it to be? Compton or Aurelius ?"

"You seem to think me an infallible prophet," I replied; "the question, I think,

should come from me, since I hear that you have only just returned from Newmarket. What say the wise men down there? Your old chum, Dan Matson, if the world says true, holds some clue to the great mystery. What can an outsider like I am know against such high authority ?"

"Oh, imperturbable sphinx," said Fenton, "don't be so mysterious; give and take, say I. It's quite true that I have been to Newmarket; I only returned yesterday, and saw Aurelius gallop in grand form; he is all over a Derby horse, and Matson does not fear anything but the redoubtable 'Compton.' He says he has the line of all the others which ran last year, and, as to the winner of

The Two Thousand Guineas,' he fancies his second stringCraftsman' can hold him safe. Come, now, I have been candid enough with my knowledge; just tell me what you hear about Compton." "

"Well, Fenton, you've spoken straight enough, and, if I could tell you half as much about him as you have done about Aurelius, I