A few days after this, Mr. Gresham gave to each of his nephews a new top.
"But how's this?" said Hal; "these tops have no strings; what shall we do for strings?"
"I have a string that will do very well for mine," said Ben; and he pulled out of his pocket the fine long smooth string which had tied up the parcel. With this he soon set up his top, which spun admirably well.
"Oh, how I wish that I had but a string!" said Hal: "what shall I do for a string? I'll tell you what: I can use the string that goes round my hat."
"But then," said Ben, "what will you do for a hatband?"
"I'll manage to do without one," said Hal and he took the string off his hat for his top. It soon was worn through; and he split his top by driving the peg too tightly into it. His cousin Ben let him set up his the next day; but Hal was not more fortunate or more careful when he meddled with other people's things than when he managed his own. He had scarcely played half an hour before he split it, by driving in the peg too violently.
Ben bore this misfortune with good humor. "Come," said he, "it can't be helped! But give me the string, because that may still be of use for something else."
It happened some time afterwards, that a lady who had been intimately acquainted with Hal's mother at Bath, that is to say, who had frequently met her at the card table during the winter, now arrived at Clifton. She was informed by his mother that Hal was at Mr. Gresham's: and her sons, who were friends of his, came to see him, and invited him to spend the next day with them.
Hal joyfully accepted the invitation. He was always glad to go out to dine, because it gave him something to do, something to think of, or, at least, something to say. Besides this, he had been educated to think it was a fine thing to visit fine people; and Lady Diana Sweepstakes (for that was the name of his mother's acquaintance) was a very fine lady; and her two sons intended to be very great gentlemen.
He was in a prodigious hurry when these young gentlemen knocked at his uncle's door the next day; but just as he got to the hall door, little Patty called to him from the top of the stairs, and told him that he had dropped his pocket-handkerchief.