"I dare say not! strike me, if I didn't keep it so precious snug and quiet! However I love the girl; and curse me if I don't have her too—that's more! She shall be Mrs. Smilax Dapper, as sure as she's born, and I hope the mother of a whole regiment of little Smilaxes. And then Cherry, you shall stay a month or six weeks with us at a time, and fondle the little ones on your knees, you shall, and every thing will go on comfortable and smooth."
"Oh! veway thmooth!" cried Sir Cherry Bounce, making a slight grimace at the pleasing prospect of fondling the Little Dappers upon his knees.
"And I suppose I am not presumptuous in aspiring to the hand of Isabella? My father is a peer—and my uncle is a peer—and I have three thousand a-year of my own, beside expectations. Strike me, if I'm a man to be sneezed at!"
"Who thinkth of thneething at you?"
"I don't know exactly. And then I am not such a very bad looking fellow either. You are not ugly, Cherry, you are not—that is, not particularly ugly, although you have got pink eyes, and white lashes, and a pug nose;—but I'm more athletic, strike me!"
"I'm thure I don't dithpute what you thay."
"Well then—acknowledging all this," proceeded the captain, "how should I treat a fellow who endeavours to cut me out?"
"Thallenge him to fight with thword and pithtol," answered Sir Cherry. "But who ith he?"
"That upstart fellow, Markham, who was brought here by that odious, republican, seditious, disloyal scoundrel Armstrong, and who talks all day about poetry and music, and God knows what. However, I can't say I admire that plan of yours," continued the hussar; "swords and pistols, you know are so very dangerous; and—and—"
"And what elth?"