"Exactly," replied Daly; "in my composition are
'Arts with arms contending;'
I am a bit of every thing; but somehow all my accomplishments are so jumbled, and each is so minute in itself, that they are patched together in my mind like the squares of a harlequin's jacket, only to make their master ridiculous. Here, however, comes Sir Timothy himself. You are my clerk—keep the staff and the joke up, and you shall be repaid with some of Tim's very best Lafitte, or I'm an ass."
"Good-day, sir," said Sir Timothy, somewhat warmed with the intelligence given him by the butler, and the exertion of trotting him across his lawn. "My servant tells me that you are here for the purpose of deciding upon the line of some new branch of the Paddington Canal;—it is very extraordinary I never should have heard of it!"
"You ought, Sir Timothy," said Daly, "to have been apprised of it. Do you understand much of ground-plans, Sir Timothy?"
"No, sir; very little indeed," replied the worthy knight.
"So much the better," I heard Daly distinctly say, for he could not resist an impulse. "If you will just cast your eye over this paper, I will endeavour to explain, sir. A, there you see;—A is your house, Sir Timothy; B is the conservatory; C is the river,—that perhaps you will think strange?"
"No, sir," said Sir Timothy, "not at all."
"Then, sir, D, E, F, and G are the points, from which I take the direct line from the bridge at Brentford; and thus you perceive, by continuing that line to the corner of Twickenham churchyard, where the embouchure is to be——"