"
As he spoke, the two smokers approached; shaggy, uncombed ruffians,
whose enormous mustaches were turned back over their ears, and mingled
with the wild elf-locks of their hair, much of which was seen under
the old beavers which they wore aside upon their heads, while some
straggling portion escaped through the rents of the hats aforesaid.
Their tarnished plush jerkins, large slops, or trunk-breeches, their
broad greasy shoulder-belts, and discoloured scarfs, and, above all,
the ostentatious manner in which the one wore a broad-sword and the
other an extravagantly long rapier and poniard, marked the true
Alsatian bully, then, and for a hundred years afterwards, a well-known
character.
"Tour out," said the one ruffian to the other; "tour the bien mort
twiring at the gentry cove!" [Footnote: Look sharp. See how the girl
is coquetting with the strange gallants!]
"I smell a spy," replied the other, looking at Nigel. "Chalk him
across the peepers with your cheery." [Footnote: Slash him over the
eyes with your dagger.]
"Bing avast, bing avast!" replied his companion; "yon other is
rattling Reginald Lowestoffe of the Temple--I know him; he is a good
boy, and free of the province."
So saying, and enveloping themselves in another thick cloud of smoke,
they went on without farther greeting.
"_Grasso in aere_!" said the Templar. "You hear what a character the
impudent knave gives me; but, so it serves your lordship's turn, I
care not.
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