Page:Guy Mannering Vol 1.djvu/340

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
330
GUY MANNERING.

praise themselves and affect to undervalue all other nations, they leave us, luckily, trap-doors and back-doors open, by which we strangers, less favoured by nature, may arrive at a share of their advantages. And thus they are, in some respects, like a boastful landlord, who exalts the value and flavour of his six-years-old mutton, while he is delighted to dispense a share of it to all the company. In short, you, whose proud family, and I, whose hard fate, made us soldiers of fortune, have the pleasant recollection, that, in the British service, stop where we may upon our career, it is only for want of money to pay the turnpike, and not from our being prohibited to travel the road. If, therefore, you can persuade little Weischel to come into ours, for God's sake let him buy the ensigncy, live prudently, mind his duty, and trust to the fates for promotion.

"And now, I hope you are expiring with curiosity to learn the end of my ro-