"
"Do they use such terms of me?" said Lord Nigel. "Death and the
devil!"
"And the devil's dam, my lord," answered Richie; "they are all three
busy in London.--And, besides, Lutin and his master laughed at you, my
lord, for letting it be thought that--I shame to speak it--that ye
were over well with the wife of the decent honest man whose house you
but now left, as not sufficient for your new bravery, whereas they
said, the licentious scoffers, that you pretended to such favour when
you had not courage enough for so fair a quarrel, and that the
sparrow-hawk was too craven-crested to fly at the wife of a
cheesemonger."--He stopped a moment, and looked fixedly in his
master's face, which was inflamed with shame and anger, and then
proceeded. "My lord, I did you justice in my thought, and myself too;
for, thought I, he would have been as deep in that sort of profligacy
as in others, if it hadna been Richie's four quarters."
"What new nonsense have you got to plague me with?" said Lord Nigel.
"But go on, since it is the last time I am to be tormented with your
impertinence,--go on, and make the most of your time."
"In troth," said Richie, "and so will I even do. And as Heaven has
bestowed on me a tongue to speak and to advise----"
"Which talent you can by no means be accused of suffering to remain
idle," said Lord Glenvarloch, interrupting him.
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