CHAPTER V. Mr Gideon Forsyth and the Gigantic Box

It has been mentioned that at Bournemouth Julia sometimes made

acquaintances; it is true she had but a glimpse of them before the

doors of John Street closed again upon its captives, but the glimpse

was sometimes exhilarating, and the consequent regret was tempered

with hope. Among those whom she had thus met a year before was a young

barrister of the name of Gideon Forsyth.

About three o'clock of the eventful day when the magistrate tampered

with the labels, a somewhat moody and distempered ramble had carried

Mr Forsyth to the corner of John Street; and about the same moment Miss

Hazeltine was called to the door of No. 16 by a thundering double knock.

Mr Gideon Forsyth was a happy enough young man; he would have been

happier if he had had more money and less uncle. One hundred and

twenty pounds a year was all his store; but his uncle, Mr Edward Hugh

Bloomfield, supplemented this with a handsome allowance and a great

deal of advice, couched in language that would probably have been judged

intemperate on board a pirate ship. Mr Bloomfield was indeed a figure

quite peculiar to the days of Mr Gladstone; what we may call (for the

lack of an accepted expression) a Squirradical. Having acquired years

without experience, he carried into the Radical side of politics those

noisy, after-dinner-table passions, which we are more accustomed to

connect with Toryism in its severe and senile aspects. To the opinions

The Wrong Box