The landlord did decide. The buckskins had disappeared--the credit of his house was at stake--the house of Baring was his enemy--there was no help for it. The double-milled and £45 were handed over--the wrath of our gentleman was appeased--he even, before he slipped into the coach, promised to patronise the hotel.
The coach had been on the road about six hours, when the waiter stepped over to his chum, the waiter of the hotel opposite, to tell him what a shindy there had been about a pair of buckskins; the other waiter produced the buckskins left in pledge; and on their description of our gentleman, no doubt was left but that, although not probable, it was very possible that a gentleman could come into an hotel _without his inexpressibles_.
The landlord was almost frantic at having been so imposed upon; but, as usual in all such cases, he soon made up the loss incurred by our gentleman's visit to the hotel, by charging it upon those who came there, not only with buckskins, but with money in their buckskins-pockets; and thus ends my story of "How to raise the Wind; or, the Buckskins."
Something whispers us that we should here commence moralising, that we should first expatiate on the nothingness of worldly gaud and greatness--enlarge on the changefulness of human prospects, and discover to our readers' view the myriads of blanks with which that fraudulent jade Fortune dilutes the few prizes she dispenses from her wheel. But then again, another something whispers us, we had far better get on with our subject, and we think we had.
Be it known then, that ever since a certain morning, (Anno Domini something,) when our nursery-maid walked us through Bartholomew Fair, and showed us _all_ the pretty things, and treated our little palate to one or two of the nice ones, we have felt a remarkable passion for fairs--Bartholomew fair in particular. We will adventure to measure our love for it against that of its tutelar saint--but alas! we forget--it has no tutelar saint now; he has long since turned his back upon it. Yes, when prosperity went hand in hand with it, when joy, mirth, and splendour, were its friends, _then_ could that faithless guardian--but, we must commence again, this is too moral--too moral by half. Once more then.