'We'll drive up to your Club,' he said.

'Hartswood dines with me this evening, to confer,' rejoined Sir Lukin.
'Will you meet him?'

'I can't,' said Redworth, 'I have to see a lady, whose affairs I have been attending to in the City; and I 'm engaged for the evening. You perceive, my good fellow,' he resumed, as they rolled along, 'this is a delicate business. You have to consider your wife. Mrs. Warwick's, name won't come up, but another woman's will.'

'I meet Wroxeter at a gambling-house he frequents, and publicly call him cheat—slap his face, if need be.'

'Sure to!' repeated Redworth. 'No stupid pretext will quash the woman's name. Now, such a thing as a duel would give pain enough.'

'Of course; I understand,' Sir Lukin nodded his clear comprehension.
'But what is it you advise, to trounce the scoundrel, and silence him?'

'Leave it to me for a day. Let me have your word that you won't take a step: positively—neither you nor Colonel Hartswood. I'll see you by appointment at your Club.' Redworth looked up over the chimneys. 'We 're going to have a storm and a gale, I can tell you.'

'Gale and storm!' cried Sir Lukin; 'what has that got to do with it?'

'Think of something else for, a time.'

'And that brute of a woman—deuced handsome she is!—if you care for fair women, Redworth:—she's a Venus, jumped slap out of the waves, and the Devil for sire—that you learn: running about, sowing her lies. She's a yellow witch. Oh! but she's a shameless minx. And a black-leg cur like Wroxeter! Any woman intimate with a fellow like that, stamps herself. I loathe her. Sort of woman who swears in the morning you're the only man on earth; and next day—that evening-engaged!—fee to Polly Hopkins —and it's a gentleman, a nobleman, my lord!—been going on behind your back half the season!—and she isn't hissed when she abuses a lady, a saint in comparison! You know the world, old fellow:—Brighton, Richmond, visits to a friend as deep in the bog. How Fryar-Gunnett— a man, after all—can stand it! And drives of an afternoon for an airing-by heaven! You're out of that mess, Redworth: not much taste for the sex; and you're right, you're lucky. Upon my word, the corruption of society in the present day is awful; it's appalling.—I rattled at her: and oh! dear me, perks on her hind heels and defies me to prove: and she's no pretender, but hopes she's as good as any of my "chaste Dianas." My dear old friend, it's when you come upon women of that kind you have a sickener. And I'm bound by the best there is in a man-honour, gratitude, all the' list—to defend Diana Warwick.'