"Instinct!" repeated John Barty, puffing out a vast cloud of smoke— "instinct does all right for 'osses, Barnabas, dogs likewise; but what's nat'ral to 'osses an' dogs aren't nowise nat'ral to us! No, you can't come instinct over human beings,—not nohowsoever, Barnabas, my lad. And, as I told you afore, a gentleman is nat'rally born a gentleman an' his feyther afore him an' his grand-feyther afore him, back an' back—"
"To Adam?" inquired Barnabas; "now, if so, the question is—was Adam a gentleman?"
"Lord, Barnabas!" exclaimed John Barty, with a reproachful look— "why drag in Adam? You leave poor old Adam alone, my lad. Adam indeed! What's Adam got to do wi' it?"
"Everything, we being all his descendants,—at least the Bible says so.—Lords and Commons, Peers and Peasants—all are children of Adam; so come now, father, was Adam a gentleman, Yes or No?"
John Barty frowned up at the ceiling, frowned down at the floor, and finally spoke:
"What do you say to that, Natty Bell?"
"Why, I should say, John—hum!"
"Pray haven't you heard of a jolly young coal-heaver,
Who down at Hungerford used for to ply,
His daddles he used with such skill and dexterity
Winning each mill, sir, and blacking each eye."
"Ha!—I should say, John, that Adam being in the habit o' going about—well, as you might put it—in a free and easy, airy manner, fig leaves an' suchlike, John,—I should say as he didn't have no call to be a gentleman, seeing as there weren't any tailors."
"Tailors!" exclaimed John, staring. "Lord! and what have tailors got to do wi' it, Natty Bell?"