"Rum tantrums! What the devil, did the man eat your grandmother?"

Roused perhaps by so pertinent and sensible a question, the Stranger
lifted his head from his breast, and said with a forced smile, "You have
done me, without knowing it, a great kindness, my friend. Eugene Aram was
an early and intimate acquaintance of mine: we have not met for many
years. I never guessed that he lived in these parts: indeed I did not
know where he resided. I am truly glad to think I have lighted upon him
thus unexpectedly."

"What! you did not know where he lived? Well! I thought all the world
knew that! Why, men from the univarsities have come all the way, merely
to look at the spot."

"Very likely," returned the Stranger; "but I am not a learned man myself,
and what is celebrity in one set is obscurity in another. Besides, I have
never been in this part of the world before!"

Peter was about to reply, when he heard the shrill voice of his wife
behind.

"Why don't you rise, Mr. Lazyboots? Where are your eyes? Don't you see
the young ladies."

Dealtry's hat was off in an instant,--the stiff Corporal rose like a
musquet; the Stranger would have kept his seat, but Dealtry gave him an
admonitory tug by the collar; accordingly he rose, muttering a hasty
oath, which certainly died on his lips when he saw the cause which had
thus constrained him into courtesy.