The door was opened by a little
elderly groom, grey-coated, grey-gaitered, grey-haired, grey-visaged. He
had the look of a respectable old family retainer, and his exquisitely
neat groom's dress gave him a sort of interest in my eyes. Class costumes,
relics though they are of feudalism, carry a charm with them. They are
symbolic, definitive; they bestow a personality on the wearer, which
satisfies the mind, by enabling it instantly to classify him, to connect
him with a thousand stories and associations; and to my young mind, the
wiry, shrewd, honest, grim old serving-man seemed the incarnation of all
the wonders of Newmarket, and the hunting-kennel, and the steeple-chase,
of which I had read, with alternate admiration and contempt, in the
newspapers. He ushered me in with a good breeding which surprised
me;--without insolence to me, or servility to his master; both of which I
had been taught to expect.
Lord Lynedale bade me very courteously sit down while he examined the
proofs. I looked round the low-wainscoted apartment, with its narrow
mullioned windows, in extreme curiosity.
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