One said:

"Young man, dash not the cup of happiness from your life!"

I said:

"I have no objection to a cup, but I cannot stand an entire
hogshead!"

They grew more and more tender--two put their arms around me and
pinioned me, while the other fifteen drew large shears from their
pockets, and, under pretence of getting a lock of hair for each,
they left me as bare as a goose-egg. Indians couldn't have scalped
me closer. I made Samson-like my escape from these Delilahs by
stratagem. I assured them that I was sickening for the measles,
which, like love, is always the more fatal the later it comes in
life. I also told them that my friend Hingston was a much better
looking man than I was; also that he was an Englishman, and that,
according to that nation's creed, every Englishman is equal to five
Americans and five hundred Frenchmen: consequently there would be
some to spare of him. This happy thought saved me. I was let off
upon solemnly promising to deliver Hingston into their arms, bound,
Laocoon-like, by the serpent spells of their charms, or, like
Regulus, potted and preserved in a barrel of fingernails, for their
especial scratching.

Hingston, little dreaming of the sale I had made of him, went on the
pretended errand of conveying to these seventeen beauties a farewell
bouquet. Poor fellow! that is the last I ever saw of him--he was
never heard of again.