And now, Mr. Romany Rye, to testify my regard for you,
I give you the shilling and the hair. I think you have a kind of
respect for Miss Berners; but whether you have or not, keep them as
long as you can, and whenever you look at them think of the finest
woman in England, and of John Dale, the jockey of Horncastle. I
believe I have told you my history," said he--"no, not quite; there
is one circumstance I had passed over. I told you that I have
thriven very well in business, and so I have, upon the whole; at
any rate, I find myself comfortably off now. I have horses, money,
and owe nobody a groat; at any rate, nothing but what I could pay
to-morrow. Yet I have had my dreary day, ay, after I had obtained
what I call a station in the world. All of a sudden, about five
years ago, everything seemed to go wrong with me--horses became
sick or died, people who owed me money broke or ran away, my house
caught fire, in fact, everything went against me; and not from any
mismanagement of my own. I looked round for help, but--what do you
think?--nobody would help me. Somehow or other it had got abroad
that I was in difficulties, and everybody seemed disposed to avoid
me, as if I had got the plague. Those who were always offering me
help when I wanted none, now, when they thought me in trouble,
talked of arresting me.
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