"Lor! bless you, how timorsome you are, 'tain't loaded."

"Loaded or not loaded, it's werry unpleasant to ride with that gun o'
yours looking into one's ear so."

"Vell, don't be afeard, I'll twist it over t'other shoulder,--there! but
a gun ain't a coach, you know, vich goes off whether it's loaded or not.
Hollo! Spriggs! here you are, my boy, lord! how you are figg'd
out--didn't know you--jump up!"

"Vere's my instrument o' destruction?" enquired the lively Augustus, when
he had succeeded in mounting to his seat.

"Stow'd him in the boot!"

The coachman mounted and drove off; the sportsmen chatting and laughing
as they passed through 'merry Islington.'

"Von't ve keep the game alive!" exclaimed Spriggs, slapping his friend
upon the back.

"I dessay you will," remarked the caustic old boy with the pigtail; "for
it's little you'll kill, young gentlemen, and that's my belief!"

"On'y let's put 'em up, and see if we don't knock 'em down, as cleverly
as Mister Robins does his lots," replied Spriggs, laughing at his own
wit.

Arrived at Highgate, the old gentleman, with a step-fatherly anxiety,
bade them take care of the 'spring-guns' in their perambulations.