WHEN PAPA SWORE IN HINDUSTANI
"Sylvia!"
"Yes, papa."
"That infernal dog of yours——"
"Oh, papa!"
"Yes, that infernal dog of yours has been at my carnations again!"
Colonel Reynolds, V.C., glared sternly across the table at Miss Sylvia Reynolds, and Miss Sylvia Reynolds looked in a deprecatory manner back at Colonel Reynolds, V.C.; while the dog in question—a foppish pug—happening to meet the colonel's eye in transit, crawled unostentatiously under the sideboard, and began to wrestle with a bad conscience.
"Oh, naughty Tommy!" said Miss Reynolds mildly, in the direction of the sideboard.
"Yes, my dear," assented the colonel; "and if you could convey to him the information that if he does it once more—yes, just once more!—I shall shoot him on the spot you would be doing him a kindness." And the colonel bit a large crescent out of his toast, with all the energy and conviction of a man who has thoroughly made up his mind. "At six o'clock this morning," continued he, in a voice of gentle melancholy, "I happened to look out of my bedroom window, and saw him. He had then destroyed two of my best plants, and was commencing on a third, with every appearance of self-satisfaction. I threw two large brushes and a boot at him."