"Mr. Beverley," said he, "I salute you, your very humble obedient servant, Mr. Beverley, sir, God keep you!" Hereupon he put on his hat again, and fell into his swinging stride.
"So," said he, "that point being settled it remains to master the intricacies of the bow." Saying which, he once more had recourse to the "priceless wollum," and walked on through the glory of the morning, with his eyes upon the valuable instructions of the "Person of Quality."
Now, as he went, chancing to look up suddenly, he beheld a gate-post. A very ancient gate-post it was—a decrepit gate-post, worn and heavy with years, for it leaned far out from the perpendicular. And with his gaze upon this, Barnabas halted suddenly, clapped the book to his bosom, and raising his hat with an elegant flourish, bowed to that gnarled and withered piece of timber as though it had been an Archduke at the very least, or the loveliest lady in the land.
"Ha! by Thor and Odin, what's all this?" cried a voice behind him.
"I say what the devil's all this?"
Turning sharp about, Barnabas beheld a shortish, broad-shouldered individual in a befrogged surtout and cords, something the worse for wear, who stood with his booted legs wide apart and stared at him from a handsome bronzed face, with a pair of round blue eyes; he held a broad-brimmed hat in his hand—the other, Barnabas noticed, was gone from the elbow.
"Egad!" said he, staring at Barnabas with his blue eyes. "What's in the wind? I say, what the devil, sir—eh, sir?"
Forthwith Barnabas beamed upon him, and swept him another bow almost as low as that he had bestowed upon the gate-post.
"Sir," said he, hat gracefully flourished in the air, "your very humble obedient servant to command."
"A humble obedient fiddlestick, sir!" retorted the new comer. "Pooh, sir!—I say dammit!—are ye mad, sir, to go bowing and scraping to a gate-post, as though it were an Admiral of the Fleet or Nelson himself—are ye mad or only drunk, sir? I say, what d' ye mean?"
Here Barnabas put on his hat and opened the book.