New guests, like Yorke himself, flocked in,
and stood and stared, or paraded the room; while the less recent
arrivals laughed and chatted together noisily, with their backs to the
fires--of which there were no less than three alight--or lolled at full
length upon the damask sofas. These persons were not, upon the whole, of
an aristocratic type; many of them, indeed, were of good birth, and all
had taken the usual pains with their costume, but a life of dissipation
had set its vulgarizing mark on them: on the seniors the pallid and
exhausted look of the _roue_ was indeed rarely seen--country air and
rough exercise had forbidden that--but drink and hard living had written
their autographs upon them in another and worse handwriting. Blotches
and pimples had indeed so erased their original likeness to gentlemen
that it was even whispered by the scandalous that it was to prevent the
confusion with his menials, that must needs have otherwise arisen, that
the Squire of Crompton compelled his guests to wear red coats. The
_habitues_ of the place, who were the contemporaries of the Squire, had,
as it were, gone to seed. But there was a sprinkling of a better class,
or, at all events, of a class that had not as yet sunk so low as they in
the mire of debauchery: a young lord or two in their minority, whom
their parents or guardians could not coerce into keeping better company;
and other young gentlemen of fashion, in whose eyes Carew was "A
devilish good fellow at bottom;" "Quite a character, by Jove!" and "A
sort of man to know.
Pages:
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71