WYLDER'S HAJVD.
205
"Oh! quite so," said the Captain, looking up sudden-
ly, with a momentary glare, like a man newly-waked from
a narcotic doze.
CHAPTER XXXV.
THE HUNT BALL.
By this time your humble servant, tbe chronicler of
these Gylingden annals, had taken his leave of magnificent
old Brandon, and of its strangely interesting young mis-
tress, and was carrying away with him, as he flew along
the London rails, the broken imagery of that grand and
shivered dream. He was destined, however, before very
long, to revisit these scenes; and in the meantime heard,
in rude outline, the tenor of what was happening — the
minute incidents and coloring of which were afterwards
faithfully communicated.
The Hunt Ball is the great annual event of Gylingden.
The critical process of "coming out" is here consumma-
ted by the young ladies of that town and vicinage. It is
looked back upon for one-half of the year, and forward
to for the other. People date by it. The battle of Ink-
erman was fought immediately before the Hunt Ball. It
was so many weeks after the Hunt Ball that the Czar
Nicholas died. Its solemn and universal importance in
Gylingden and the country round, gave me some notion
of what the feast of unleavened bread must have been to
the Hebrews and Jerusalem.
The connubial capabilities of Gylingden are positively
wretched. When I knew it, there were but three single
men, according even to the modest measure of Gylingden