"What are these?" said the governor, peering through his glasses at a long battalion of figures at the foot of the score,—"what are these? Groschen, eh?"
"Pardon, Monsieur le Comte," said the other, bowing, "dey are Prussian thalers!"
I wish you saw his face when he heard it! George and I were obliged to bolt out of the room, or we should have infallibly exploded.
"You 'd better go back," said George to me after we had our laugh out; "I 'll take a stroll with the womenkind till you smooth him down a bit."
A pleasant office this for me; but there was no help for it, so in I went.
The first shock of his surprise was not over as I entered, for he stood holding the bill in one hand, while he pressed the other on his forehead, with a most distracted expression of face.
"Do you suspect," said he—"have you any notion of what rate we are living at, James?"
"Not the slightest," replied I.
"Do you think it 's of any consequence?" asked he again, in a harsher tone.
"Why, of course, sir, it—is—of some con—"