conveying the count to his lodgings, and was then walking to and fro before the gaming-house door; for you are to know, my good reader, if you have never been a man of wit and pleasure about town, that, as the voracious pike lieth snug under some weed before the mouth of any of those little streams which discharge themselves into a large river, waiting for the small fry which issue thereout, so hourly, before the door or mouth of these gaming-houses, doth Mr. Snap, or some other gentleman of his occupation, attend the issuing forth of the small fry of young gentlemen, to whom they deliver little slips of parchment, containing invitations of the said gentlemen to their houses, together with one Mr. John Doe,[Footnote:  This is a fictitious name which is put into every writ; for what purpose the lawyers best know.] a person whose company is in great request.  Mr. Snap, among many others of these billets, happened to have one directed to Mr. Bagshot, being at the suit or solicitation of one Mrs. Anne Sample, spinster, at whose house the said Bagshot had lodged several months, and whence he had inadvertently departed without taking a formal leave, on which account Mrs. Anne had taken this method of speaking with him.

Mr. Snap’s house being now very full of good company, he was obliged to introduce Mr. Bagshot into the count’s apartment, it being, as he said, the only chamber he had to Lock up in.  Mr. Wild no sooner saw his friend than he ran eagerly to embrace him, and immediately presented him to the count, who received him with great civility.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Other particulars relating to Miss Tishy, which perhaps may not
greatly surprise after the former.  The description of A very fine
gentleman.  And A dialogue between wild and the count, in which
public virtue is just hinted at, with, etc.

Mr. Snap had turned the key a very few minutes before a servant of the family called Mr. Bagshot out of the room, telling him there was a person below who desired to speak with him; and this was no other than Miss Laetitia Snap, whose admirer Mr. Bagshot had long been, and in whose tender breast his passion had raised a more ardent flame than that which any of his rivals had been able to raise.  Indeed, she was so extremely fond of this youth, that she often confessed to her female confidents, if she could ever have listened to the thought of living with any one man, Mr. Bagshot was he.  Nor was she singular in this inclination, many other young ladies being her rivals in this matter, who had all the great and noble qualifications necessary to form a true gallant, and which nature is seldom