On seeing me, he finished off the saint with a few galloping flourishes, pushed the fiddle on the table; transferred the stick to his left hand, and made a rapid advance, or rather toddle, towards me, with his right extended.
“Hah, sur, I’m glad to see you,” said he; “Mr. Gernon, I believe? Very happy indeed to have your company, sur; shall be glad to show you ivery attintion in ivery sense of the word, sur, for the sake of my old friend Sir Toby; and I doubt not,” he continued, with a low bow of the old school and a smile, “that I shall be able also to add, on your own.”
As he made this courteous speech and inclination, his eye lighted on a letter lying on the table, which quickly threw the irritable old fellow off his balance, and put the courtier to flight.
“Why,——mee heart, Cordalia,” he thundered out in a voice that startled me; “by all that’s good, that egragious ass, Ramdial, has gone without the letter. A man naid have the timper of an angel to dale with these fellows.”
Mrs. Delaval, to cut the affair short, rose immediately from her seat, and taking the letter, called a servant to the head of the stairs, and quickly rectified the omission.
“Thank ye, Cordalia, mee love,” said the old general as she returned; “thank ye, mee darling;” and taking her hand and drawing the graceful creature towards him, he imprinted a kiss on her cheek.
There’s no use mincing matters—I certainly envied him the privilege.
This little interruption over, I returned to a speech which, having previously worded and fashioned in rather a superior style, I thought it a pity should be lost.
I said, after a hem or two, that I felt deeply obliged for his cordial reception of me, that I should study to deserve his good opinion, and to realize the gratifying anticipations he had so obligingly expressed, &c. &c.
“Ye will, sur; ye will, sur,” said the general; “I’ve not the laste doubt of it; and, plase God, we’ll some day see you as accomplished a soldier as was your poor uncle, the colonel.”