Billings put himself into the most approved
attitude of the Cockpit, and invited his father, the reverend
gentleman, and Monsieur la Rose the valet, to engage with him in a
pugilistic encounter. The two latter, the Abbe especially, seemed
dreadfully frightened; but the Count now looked on with much
interest; and, giving utterance to a feeble kind of chuckle, which
lasted for about half a minute, said,--
"Paws off, Pompey! You young hangdog, you--egad, yes, aha! 'pon
honour, you're a lad of spirit; some of your father's spunk in you,
hey? I know him by that oath. Why, sir, when I was sixteen, I used
to swear--to swear, egad, like a Thames waterman, and exactly in
this fellow's way! Buss me, my lad; no, kiss my hand. That will
do"--and he held out a very lean yellow hand, peering from a pair of
yellow ruffles. It shook very much, and the shaking made all the
rings upon it shine only the more.
"Well," says Mr. Billings, "if you wasn't a-going to abuse me nor
mother, I don't care if I shake hands with you. I ain't proud!"
The Abbe laughed with great glee; and that very evening sent off to
his Court a most ludicrous spicy description of the whole scene of
meeting between this amiable father and child; in which he said that
young Billings was the eleve favori of M.
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