Page:Paul Clifford Vol 1.djvu/243

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PAUL CLIFFORD.
213

the present quiet of the 'Jolly Angler,' shall be turned out neck and crop—shan't he, Attie?"

"Right about, march," said the hero.

"Ay, that's the word, Attie," said Gentleman George: "and now, Mr. Pepper, if there be any ill blood 'twixt you and the lad there, wash it away in a bumper of bingo, and let's hear no more whatsomever about it."

"I'm willing," cried long Ned, with the deferential air of a courtier, and holding out his hand to Paul. Our hero, being somewhat abashed by the novelty of his situation and the rebuke of Gentleman George, accepted, though with some reluctance, the proffered courtesy.

Order being thus restored, the conversation of the convivialists began to assume a most fascinating bias. They talked with infinite goút of the sums they had levied on the public, and the peculations they had committed for what one called the "good of the community" and another, the "established order,"——meaning themselves. It was easy to see in what school the discerning Augustus Tomlinson had learnt the value of words.

There was something edifying in hearing the