Sharpness, for you cannot prod down a tree with the point of a rapier.
“Fancy her yourself?” said the Dwarf, showing his yellow teeth with a detestable grin; while Ricardo turned quite white with anger, and not knowing how to deal with this insufferable little monster.
“I’m a widower, I am,” said the Dwarf, “though I’m out of mourning,” for he wore a dirty clay-coloured Yellow jacket. “My illustrious consort, the Princess Frutilla, did not behave very nice, and I had to avenge my honour; in fact, I’m open to any offers, however humble. Going at an alarming sacrifice! Come to my box” (and he pointed to a filthy clay cottage, all surrounded by thistles, nettles, and black boggy water), “and I’ll talk over your proposals.”
“Hold your impudent tongue!” said Dick. “The Princess Frutilla was an
injured saint; and as for the lady whom I shall not name in your polluting presence, I am her knight, and I defy you to deadly combat!”
We may imagine how glad the princess was when (disguised as a wasp) she heard Dick say he was her knight; not that, in fact, he had thought of it before.
“Oh! you’re for a fight, are you?” sneered the Dwarf. “I might tell you to hit one of your own weight, but I’m not afraid of six of you. Yah! mammy’s brat! Look here, young Blinkers, I don’t want to hurt you. Just turn old Dobbin’s head, and trot back to your mammy, Queen Rosalind, at Pantouflia. Does she know you’re out?”
“I’ll be into you, pretty quick,” said Ricardo. “But why do I bandy words with a miserable peasant?”
“And don’t get much the best of them
either,” said the Dwarf, provokingly. “But I’ll fight, if you will have it.”