Paul Clifford — Volume 01 by Baron Edward Bulwer Lytton Lytton
page 77 of 84 (91%)
page 77 of 84 (91%)
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more, for my eyes already begin to dance in the air; and if I listen
longer to your resistless eloquence, my feet may share the same fate!" So saying, Paul rose; nor could any entreaty, on the part of his entertainer, persuade him to resume his seat. "Nay, as you will," said Pepper, affecting a nonchalant tone, and arranging his cravat before the glass,--"nay, as you will. Ned Pepper requires no man's companionship against his liking; and if the noble spark of ambition be not in your bosom, 't is no use spending my breath in blowing at what only existed in my too flattering opinion of your qualities. So then, you propose to return to MacGrawler (the scurvy old cheat!), and pass the inglorious remainder of your life in the mangling of authors and the murder of grammar? Go, my good fellow, go! scribble again and forever for MacGrawler, and let him live upon thy brains instead of suffering thy brains to--" "Hold!" cried Paul. "Although I may have some scruples which prevent my adoption of that rising line of life you have proposed to me, yet you are very much mistaken if you imagine me so spiritless as any longer to subject myself to the frauds of that rascal MacGrawler. No! My present intention is to pay my old nurse a visit. It appears to me passing strange that though I have left her so many weeks, she has never relented enough to track me out, which one would think would have been no difficult matter; and now, you see, that I am pretty well off, having five guineas and four shillings all my own, and she can scarcely think I want her money, my heart melts to her, and I shall go and ask pardon for my haste!" "Pshaw! sentimental," cried Long Ned, a little alarmed at the thought of |
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