“What the deuce is the matter here?” he exclaimed, hastily adjusting his head-gear; “I have been following you in fear of finding your idle loggerhead knocked against one rock or other, and here I find you parted with your Bucephalus, and quarrelling with Sweepclean. A messenger, Hector, is a worse foe than a phoca, whether it be the phoca barbata, or the phoca vitulina of your late conflict.”
“D—n the phoca, sir,” said Hector, “whether it be the one or the other—I say d—n them both particularly! I think you would not have me stand quietly by and see a scoundrel like this, because he calls himself a king’s messenger, forsooth—(I hope the king has many better for his meanest errands)—insult a young lady of family and fashion like Miss Wardour?”
“Rightly argued, Hector,” said the Antiquary
