"'Whence that doleful visage,' Uncle Dick--I mean, Little-John? Is Auntie angry with you, too?"
"Yes," I answered, and sighed again.
"Oh!" said the Imp, staring, "an' do you feel like--like--wait a minute"--and once more he drew out and consulted the tattered volume--"'do you feel like hanging yourself in your sword-belt to the arm of yonder tree?'" he asked eagerly, with his finger upon a certain paragraph.
"Very like it, my Imp."
"Or--or 'hurling yourself from the topmost pinnacle of yon lofty crag?'"
"Yes, Imp; the 'loftier' the better."
"Then you must be in love, like Alan-a-Dale; he was going to hang himself, an' 'hurl himself off the topmost pinnacle,' you know, only Robin Hood said, 'Whence that doleful visage?' an' stopped him--you remember?'
"To be sure," I nodded.
"An' so you are really in love with my Auntie Lis--Her, are you?"
"Yes."