“And where might that be, sir?” asked Mr. Wharton, conceiving it necessary to say something.
“The guardroom,” said the trooper, dryly.
“What is the offense of poor Birch?” asked Miss Peyton, handing the dragoon a fourth dish of coffee.
“Poor!” cried the captain. “If he is poor, King George is a bad paymaster.”
“Yes, indeed,” said one of the subalterns, “his Majesty owes him a dukedom.”
“And congress a halter,” continued the commanding officer commencing anew on a fresh supply of the cakes.
“I am sorry,” said Mr. Wharton, “that any neighbor of mine should incur the displeasure of our rulers.”
“If I catch him,” cried the dragoon, while buttering another cake, “he will dangle from the limbs of one of his namesakes.”
“He would make no bad ornament, suspended from one of those locusts before his own door,” added the lieutenant.
“Never mind,” continued the captain; “I will have him yet before I’m a major.”