“To be sure, Jack, I’ve read the Arabian Nights. You never saw such eyes in your life: what a houri she is!”
“Is she as handsome as Agnes, Ned?”
“Twice as handsome by moonlight.”
“That’s all moonshine, and so will be your courting, for it will come to nothing.”
“Not if I can help it.”
“Why, Gascoigne, what would you do with a wife?”
“Just exactly what you would do, Jack.”
“I mean, my dear Ned, can you afford to marry?”
“Not while the old governor lives, but I know he has some money in the funds. He told me one day that I could not expect more than three thousand pounds. You know I have sisters.”
“And before you come into that you’ll have three thousand children.”