was always ready to proceed thither.  Nor had he boasted without reason, a while ago, of his powers of self-denial, for he would often forego a glass of generous wine (when he felt that he had had enough), in order to keep his hand steady for the game at pool, which invariably took place at Crompton after dinner.  His extreme obesity, though it deprived him of some advantages in the way of “reach,” was, upon the whole, a benefit to him.  His antagonists lost the sense of his superiority of skill in their enjoyment of the ridiculous and constrained postures in which he was compelled to place himself, and he was well content to see them laugh and lose.  None but a first-rate player could have held his own among that company, whose intelligence had been directed to this particular pursuit for most of their natural lives; and even “Tub Ryll,” as they called him, had to supplement his dexterity by other means to make success secure.  His liveliest sallies, his bitterest jests, were all reserved for these occasions, so that mirth or anger was forever unstringing the nerves of his competitors, and diminishing their chance of gain.  It was difficult to unstring the nerves of Parson Whymper, who ran him very close in skill, and sometimes divided the spoil with him; but on the present occasion he had a wordy weapon to baffle even that foe.  This consisted in constant allusion to the latter’s supposed reversionary interest in the living at Crompton, the incumbent whereof was ancient and infirm, and which was in the Squire’s gift.  This piece of preferment was the object of the chaplain’s dearest hopes, and the last subject he would have chosen to jest upon, especially in the presence of its patron.

“Is he to have it, Squire, or is he not?” would be Tub Ryll’s serious inquiry, just as it was the parson’s turn to play on him, or, “Who backs the vicar elect?”—­observations which seldom failed to cost that expectant divine a sovereign, for the play at the Hall table, although not so high as was going on in the Library with those who patronized cards, was for considerable stakes.  Carew, who enjoyed, above all things, this embarrassing pleasantry, would return an ambiguous reply, so that the problem remained without a solution.  But when the disgusted chaplain at last threw up his cue, in a most unusual fit of dudgeon, the Squire put the question to the company, as a case of church preferment of which he was unwilling to take the sole responsibility.  “The sum,” he said, “which had been offered to him for the next presentation would exactly defray the cost of his second pack of hounds, which his chaplain himself had advised him to put down; so the point to be considered—­”

“The hounds, the hounds!” broke in this impatient audience, amidst roars of laughter.  And nobody knew better than poor Parson Whymper that this verdict would be more final than that of most other ecclesiastical synods, and that he had lost his preferment.  It was Carew’s humor to take jest for earnest (as it was to turn into ridicule what was serious), and to pretend that his word was pledged to decisions to which nobody else would have attached the slightest weight; it pleased him to feel that his lightest word was law, or perhaps it was a part of the savage adoration which he professed to pay to truth.