"O, my new ball!" cried he, as he ran after it.
As he stooped to pick it up, he let go his hat, which he had hitherto held on with anxious care; for the hat, though it had a fine green and white cockade, had no band or string round it. The string, as we may recollect, our wasteful hero had used in spinning his top. The hat was too large for his head without this band; a sudden gust of wind blew it off; Lady Diana's horse started, and reared. She was a "famous" horsewoman, and sat him to the admiration of all beholders; but there was a puddle of red clay and water in this spot, and her ladyship's uniform-habit was a sufferer by the accident.
"Careless brat!" said she. "Why can't he keep his hat upon his head?"
In the meantime the wind blew the hat down the hill, and Hal ran after it, amidst the laughter of his kind friends, the young Sweepstakes, and the rest of the little regiment. The hat was lodged at length upon a bank. Hal pursued it: he thought this bank was hard, but, alas! The moment he set his foot upon it, the foot sank. He tried to draw it back, his other foot slipped, and he fell prostrate, in his green and white uniform, into the treacherous bed of red mud. His companions, who had halted upon the top of the hill, stood laughing spectators of his misfortune.
It happened that the poor boy with the black patch upon his eye, who had been ordered by Lady Diana to "fall back," and to "keep at a distance," was now coming up the hill; and the moment he saw our fallen hero, he hastened to his assistance. He dragged poor Hal, who was a deplorable spectacle, out of the red mud; the obliging mistress of a lodging-house, as soon as she understood that the young gentleman was nephew to Mr. Gresham, to whom she had formerly let her house, received Hal, covered as he was with dirt.
The poor Bristol lad hastened to Mr. Gresham's for clean stockings and shoes for Hal. He was unwilling to give up his uniform; it was rubbed and rubbed, and a spot here and there was washed out; and he kept continually repeating, "When it's dry it will all brush off, when it's dry it will all brush off, won't it?"
But soon the fear of being too late at the archery meeting began to balance the dread of appearing in his stained habiliments; and he now as anxiously repeated, whilst the woman held the wet coat to the fire, "O, I shall be too late; indeed, I shall be too late; make haste; it will never dry; hold it nearer—nearer to the fire; I shall lose my turn to shoot; O give me the coat; I don't mind how it is, if I can but get it on."
Holding it nearer and nearer to the fire dried it quickly, to be sure, but it shrank it also; so that it was no easy matter to get the coat on again. However, Hal, who did not see the red splashes, which, in spite of all the operations, were too visible upon his shoulders, and upon the skirts of his white coat behind, was pretty well satisfied to observe that there was not one spot upon the facings.
"Nobody," said he, "will take notice of my coat behind, I dare say. I think it looks as smart almost as ever;" and under this persuasion, our young archer resumed his bow—his bow with green ribands now no more! And he pursued his way to the Downs.
All his companions were far out of sight.