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man whom Hadleyburg delights to honour--Edward Richards."
This was received with great enthusiasm, the dog taking a hand again; the
saddler started the bids at a dollar, the Brixton folk and Barnum's
representative fought hard for it, the people cheered every jump that the
bids made, the excitement climbed moment by moment higher and higher,
the
bidders got on their mettle and grew steadily more and more daring, more
and more determined, the jumps went from a dollar up to five, then to
ten, then to twenty, then fifty, then to a hundred, then--
At the beginning of the auction Richards whispered in distress to his
wife: "Oh, Mary, can we allow it? It--it--you see, it is an
honour--reward, a testimonial to purity of character, and--and--can we
allow it? Hadn't I better get up and--Oh, Mary, what ought we to
do?--what do you think we--" [Halliday's voice. "Fifteen I'm
bid!--fifteen for the sack!--twenty!--ah, thanks!--thirty--thanks again!
Thirty, thirty, thirty!--do I hear forty?--forty it is! Keep the ball
rolling, gentlemen, keep it rolling!--fifty!--thanks, noble Roman!--going
at fifty, fifty, fifty!--seventy!--ninety!--splendid!--a hundred!--pile
it up, pile it up!--hundred and twenty--forty!--just in time!--hundred
and fifty!--Two hundred!--superb! Do I hear two h--thanks!--two hundred
and fifty!--"]
"It is another temptation, Edward--I'm all in a tremble--but, oh, we've
escaped one temptation, and that ought to warn us, to--["Six did I
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