peremptory, an affront to my honour, and sent him a challenge. We met in
Hyde Park. The fellow could not fence: I was absolutely the adroitest
swordsman in England, so I gave him three or four wounds; but at last he
ran upon me with such impetuosity, that he put me out of my play, and I
could not prevent him from whipping me through the lungs. I died the
next day, as a man of honour should, without any snivelling signs of
contrition or repentance; and he will follow me soon, for his surgeon has
declared his wounds to be mortal. It is said that his wife is dead of
grief, and that his family of seven children will be undone by his death.
So I am well revenged, and that is a comfort. For my part, I had no
wife. I always hated marriage.

_Savage_.--Mercury, I won't go in a boat with that fellow. He has
murdered his countryman--he has murdered his friend: I say, positively, I
won't go in a boat with that fellow. I will swim over the River, I can
swim like a duck.

_Mercury_.--Swim over the Styx! it must not be done; it is against the
laws of Pluto's Empire. You must go in the boat, and be quiet.

_Savage_.--Don't tell me of laws, I am a savage. I value no laws. Talk
of laws to the Englishman. There are laws in his country, and yet you
see he did not regard them, for they could never allow him to kill his
fellow-subject, in time of peace, because he asked him to pay a debt. I
know indeed, that the English are a barbarous nation, but they can't
possibly be so brutal as to make such things lawful.

_Mercury_.--You reason well against him. But how comes it that you are
so offended with murder; you, who have frequently massacred women in
their sleep, and children in the cradle?