"You'll get no pieces from him, nor he kisses from her, through me, I promise you."
"Your ears will be cropped for a certainty if you are taken back to Truro." And then, as I made no reply, he adds, "You are minded to break your uncle's heart rather than your own pride."
"Nay," says I, "there's a way by which I may spare him shame, and myself as well."
"Are you man enough to thrust a knife in your own heart?" says he.
"Ay!" says I joyfully; "do but try me. Give but my forearm fair play and lend me your dagger. You shall be rewarded, I warrant, when you tell Lady Biddy I am no more. Or do you thrust it into me if you doubt the use I should make of the knife. I promise you I will not awake a single sleeper with my groans."
He nodded approvingly, but made no attempt to take me at my word.
"Life isn't worth much," says he, "to a fool. And 'tis only a fool who thinks there's never another loaf to be got when he's eaten the last crust. Look at me," spreading his arms and surveying his rags—"a prince last month, a beggar today. What of that? I'll be a king next year. And so may you be," he adds, after a pause. But that did not tempt me; so presently he goes on:
"If you had seen what I have seen, and if you were as hideous as I am, and as old, yet you would not talk of ending your life. If you had seen as I have seen"—speaking slowly, yet with passion, as, through his half-closed eyes, he seemed to be looking at what he described—"a land where the forests are flower-gardens, more fair than hand of man can make; where trees—not like these stunted things, which are but bushes by comparison—where trees I say, seem hung with precious gems, and waters run on beds of gold and silver, and every rock is dazzling crystal; where rich fruits tempt the appetite they never cloy; where flying birds are like the flash of gems, and their song more sweet than your musician ever heard in dreams; where the sun never parches nor cold winds bite; where the gentle air is brisk as wine and charged with the scent of leagues of flowers: if you had seen that land, I say, you would want to see it again before you died."
These hints of southern glories I had heard before from my uncle; though between his speech and this poetic gipsy's there was all the difference betwixt north and south.
"To see this land might tempt you to oblige Sir Bartlemy," says he. Then, after a bit, he continues, "But it does not, I perceive. You know the intent of this enterprise—first, to gratify your uncle's whim; and, next, to enrich Sir Harry, that he may wed Lady Biddy. You have no relish to help him that way—to come home with a gruesome face to pull the joy-bells at their wedding?"