so deeply to his affair, I would see him through with it.
"Madam," he broke in on my thoughts, "two feet of straight and honest steel is worth a mile of strategy. Give me a sword, and bother your head no more about me."
"'Tis bloody mindedness," says I; "and you such a tender, handsome boy!"
"I am not tender; I am not handsome; I am not a boy," says he.
"You are the very handsomest lad I ever saw," says I, mischievously, "and Mrs. Polly Emblem knows it also. She looks on you as sweetly as though you were a corporal."
"Bah!" he cries, "do you suppose, madam, that I will let a parcel of women pet me like a terrier pup. I was born for better things, I hope."
"For the whipping-post, the pillory, the Tolbooth, you saucy rogue," says I, laughing at his anger, and the way he treated one of the foremost ladies in the State. "But you know you are very handsome, now," says I, in a very coaxing manner.
"To be handsome," he replied, "a man must be six feet high; splendid wide shoulders; slender hips, and muscles made of steel. No, I am not handsome. I am only a little fellow; five feet five inches is my height; my frame hath no more consistency than your own. See how my shoulders slope, and my very voice is thin and feminine."
