This domestic speech, my boy, was too much for Munchausen. Asking one of the rag merchants to hold his three-ply overcoat, and carefully removing his fragmentary cap, that none of the cold potatoes should spill out of it, he planted the remains of his right boot slightly in advance of the skeleton of his left, and thundered:
"'Sblood!"
Quick as the lightning leaps along the cloud did Captain Villiam Brown send the great toe of his dexter foot to meet that of his foe; his Damascus blade lay across the opposing brand, and he whispered:
"'Sdeath!"
It was a beautiful sight—by Minerva it was!
"Stop!" says Villiam, suddenly hauling in his weapon again; "it shall never be said that I took advantage of a foeman."
As he uttered these memorable words, my boy, this ornament of the service plucked an infant demijohn from his fearless bosom and magnanimously passed it to his antagonist.
A soft commotion was visible in the whiskers of Captain Munchausen—the suburb of a smile as it were; a cavern opened in their midst, the vessel ascended curvilinearly thereto, and the sound was as the trickling of water down a mountain gulch.
The adjutant took his seat on the sleeping body of the band, and with pencil and paper prepared to record the combat. The opposing champions faced each other, and as Villiam once more raised his blade he smiled horribly.
Then, my boy, was witnessed a scene to make old Charlemagne's paladins dance High-jinks in their graves, and call all the Arturian knights to life again. Carte et tierce! but it was a spectacle for Hector and Achilles. With swords pointed straight at each other's noses did the valorous heroes skip wildly back, and then as wildly forward. Slam! bang! crack! smack! right and left! over and under! parry, feint, and première force! Now did they hop fierily along on opposite sides of the road, eyeing each other like demoniac Thomas Cats upon the moonlit fence. Ever and anon did they dart furiously to the centre, cutting the blessed atmosphere to invisible splinters, and slaying imaginary legions.