"William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity fair" - читать интересную книгу автора

the drawing-room; and these four young persons passed
such a comfortable evening together, that they declared
they were rather glad of the thunder-storm than
otherwise, which had caused them to put off their
visit to Vauxhall.

Osborne was Sedley's godson, and had been one of the
family any time these three-and-twenty years. At six
weeks old, he had received from John Sedley a present
of a silver cup; at six months old, a coral with gold
whistle and bells; from his youth upwards he was
"tipped" regularly by the old gentleman at Christmas:
and on going back to school, he remembered perfectly
well being thrashed by Joseph Sedley, when the latter
was a big, swaggering hobbadyhoy, and George an
impudent urchin of ten years old. In a word, George was
as familiar with the family as such daily acts of
kindness and intercourse could make him.

"Do you remember, Sedley, what a fury you were in,
when I cut off the tassels of your Hessian boots, and
how Miss-hem!-how Amelia rescued me from a
beating, by falling down on her knees and crying out to
her brother Jos, not to beat little George?"

Jos remembered this remarkable circumstance
perfectly well, but vowed that he had totally
forgotten it.

"Well, do you remember coming down in a gig to Dr.
Swishtail's to see me, before you went to India, and
giving me half a guinea and a pat on the head? I always
had an idea that you were at least seven feet high, and
was quite astonished at your return from India to find
you no taller than myself."

"How good of Mr. Sedley to go to your school and
give you the money!" exclaimed Rebecca, in accents of
extreme delight.

"Yes, and after I had cut the tassels of his boots too.
Boys never forget those tips at school, nor the givers."

"I delight in Hessian boots," said Rebecca. Jos Sedley,
who admired his own legs prodigiously, and always
wore this ornamental chaussure, was extremely pleased
at this remark, though he drew his legs under his chair
as it was made.

"Miss Sharp!" said George Osborne, "you who are