"
"What a man!" said Miss Pescod afterwards to Miss Sally Tregentil,
who had dropped in for a cup of tea.
And yet the Major was a bachelor. They could not help wondering a
little.
"With two such names, too!" mused Miss Sally. "'Solomon' and
'Hymen'; they certainly suggest--they would almost seem to give
promise of, at least, a _dual_ destiny."
"You mark my words," said Miss Pescod. "That man has been crossed in
love."
"But _who_?" asked Miss Sally, her eyes widening in speculation.
"_Who_ could have done such a thing?"
"My dear, I understand there are women in London capable of
anything."
The Major, you must know, had spent the greater part of his life in
the capital as a silk-mercer and linen-draper--I believe, in the
Old Jewry; at any rate, not far from Cheapside. He had left us at
the age of sixteen to repair the fortunes of his family, once
opulent and respected, but brought low by his great-grandfather's
rash operations in South Sea stock. In London, thanks to an
ingratiating manner with the sex on which a linen-draper relies for
patronage, he had prospered, had amassed a competence, and had sold
his business to retire to his native town, as Shakespeare retired to
Stratford-on-Avon, and at about the same period of life.
Had the Major in London been crossed in love? No; I incline to
believe that Miss Pescod was mistaken. That hearts, up there,
fluttered for a man of his presence is probable, nay certain.
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