“Records! A brass plate in a village church against all the books of the College of Arms!”
“To renounce your ancestor, a knight who died in the field!”
“For the worst cause that man ever fought for!”
“On behalf of his king!”
“Who had murdered his nephews!”
“A knight! with our crest on his helmet.”
“And no brains underneath it, or he would never have had them knocked out for so bloody a villain!”
“A rascally, drudging, money-making printer!”
“The wise and glorious introducer of the art that has enlightened a world. Prefer for an ancestor, to one whom scholar and sage never name but in homage, a worthless, obscure, jolter-headed booby in mail, whose only record to men is a brass plate in a church in a village!”
My uncle turned round perfectly livid. “Enough, sir! enough! I am insulted sufficiently. I ought to have expected it. I wish you and your son a very good day.”