"If I gave thee advice, I were in truth a fool. But I'll very willingly forgive thee this time, and tell thee what I overheard to-night at the palace."
"Ah, that's a good Puck!"
"That depends on circumstances, your valiancy. I am somewhat like a dish of toasted gallinippers—whether it is palatable or not depending very much in the way it is served. But this is what I heard his majesty say to her majesty. 'Sweetbine, my dear,' said he, 'don't you think Dewbell has a fancy for our brave and noble knight, Sir Timothy Lawn?' 'Why, my love,' replied her majesty, 'I have long been almost certain that she loved him. But she is such a confirmed flirt I am afraid she can never be brought to say so. I haven't the least idea that she would not reject Sir Timothy, were he to propose.' 'We must cure her of this fatal pride and folly,' replied his majesty, 'and I think that, with a little of your assistance, I can manage it capitally.' And then the dear old people passed into the royal bed-chamber, in the japonica wing, and I heard no more."
"I'll to the king."
"And I'll to a better friend than he; if you permit me, your worship, I take my bough and leave."
"Avaunt, vile punning Puck! Thou hast been to Philadelphia, where all the streets rhyme, and every corner is a pun upon the next. May the fiend unquip thee! Away!'
"If thou I kest not jokes, thou hadst best stick to thy bachelor's-buttonhood. I tell thee, marriage is a capital joke."
"What knowest thou of marriage?"
"I am one of its fruits."
"A bitter jest, indeed, and plucked ere half ripened. St. Bulwer! but thou wilt be a mother's blessing when thou art fully grown!"