"I will call it--by the way, we were talking about Petersburg.

You had better be off." "I am going, but tell me the name of the book before I go." "No, I won't; you would go and write it yourself, and steal my thunder." Uncle Horace's eyes twinkled, and a corruscation of laugh-wrinkles shot like sheet-lightning over his face.

He disappeared into a neighbouring room, leaving a trail of white smoke in his wake, like a locomotive.
Presently he returned with a _Bullinger Guide_ in his hand.
"You can sail on Wednesday at two o'clock by the Cunarder," he said.
"You can go to Newport to-day, and come back by the boat on Tuesday night, and be ready to start in the morning." Mr.Bellingham prided himself greatly on his faculty for making combinations of times and places.
"How about those letters, Mr.Bellingham ?" inquired Claudius, who had no idea of going upon his expedition without proper preparations.
"I will write them," said Uncle Horace, "I will write them at once," and he dived into an address-book and set to work.

His pen was that of the traditional ready-writer, for he wrote endless letters, and his correspondence was typical of himself--the scholar, the wanderer, and the Priest of Buddha by turns, and sometimes all at once.

For Mr.
Bellingham was a professed Buddhist and a profound student of Eastern moralities, and he was a thorough scholar in certain branches of the classics.