"I'll shoot him—the cursed, fat, pudgy, beastly rascal, her husband. I've never seen her face, but"—
"Lord seff us!—heaven preserve us, as a body may say. Is that a respectable reason for shooting a man that you have never seen his wife's face? Come, come, be cool, John Chatterton—be cool; animum rege, as a body may"—
"Cool? a pretty thing for a steady old stager like you, to tell me to be cool. I tell you, I've been insulted, threatened, quizzed, laughed at."
"Wha laughed at ye?" enquired the major.
"The woman. I'm certain, she must have laughed. How could she avoid it? I know she laughed at me; for though I couldn't see her face for the horrid veil she kept over it, I saw from the anxiety she was in to hide it, from the shaking, of her whole figure, that she was in the convulsions of a suppressed titter. I'll shoot him as I would a partridge."
"But ye've nae license, sir, nor nae qualification either that I can see—for what did the honest man do?" said the major, amazed at the wrath of his companion.
"Do! He didn't actually call me a puppy, but he meant it. I know he did—I saw it in the twinkle of his light, prying, silly-looking eyes—the pucking up of his long, red, sneering lip."
"But ye canna fecht a man—you can't challenge a person, as a body may say, for having light eyes and long lips—what mair? quid ultra? as a body"—
"He asked me the way to the barracks."
"Weel, there's no great harm in that—non nocet, as a"—