“Take care, Monkbarns! we shall set you down among the black-nebs by and by.”
“No Sir Arthur—a tame grumbler I. I only claim the privilege of croaking in my own corner here, without uniting my throat to the grand chorus of the marsh—Ni quito Rey, ni pongo Rey—I neither make king nor mar king, as Sancho says, but pray heartily for our own sovereign, pay scot and lot, and grumble at the exciseman—But here comes the ewe-milk cheese in good time; it is a better digestive than politics.”
When dinner was over, and the decanters placed on the table, Mr. Oldbuck proposed the King’s health in a bumper, which was readily acceded to both by Lovel and the Baronet, the Jacobitism of the latter being now a sort of speculative opinion merely,—the shadow of a shade.
After the ladies had left the apartment, the landlord and Sir Arthur entered into several exquisite discussions, in which the younger guest, either on account of the abstruse erudition which they involved, or for some other reason, took but a slender share, till at length he was suddenly started out of a profound reverie by an unexpected appeal to his judgment.
“I will stand by what Mr. Lovel says; he was born in the north of England, and may know the very spot.”
Sir Arthur thought it unlikely that so young a gentleman should have paid much attention to matters of that sort.
“I am avised of the contrary,” said Oldbuck.
“How say you, Mr. Lovel?—speak up for your own credit, man.”
Lovel was obliged to confess himself in the ridiculous situation of one alike ignorant of the subject of conversation and controversy which had engaged the company for an hour.
“Lord help the lad, his head has been wool-gathering!—I thought how it would be when the womankind were admitted—no getting a word of sense out of a young fellow for six hours after.—Why, man, there was once a people called the Piks”—