"Don't you see that the captain is in a revery? What good man ever loves
to be interrupted in his meditations? Even Alfred the Great could not
bear it! Perhaps at this moment, with the true anxiety of a worthy
chief, the captain is designing something for our welfare!"

"Captain indeed!" muttered Long Ned, darting a wrathful look at Clifford,
who had not deigned to pay any attention to Mr. Pepper's threat; "for my
part I cannot conceive what was the matter with us when we chose this
green slip of the gallows-tree for our captain of the district. To be
sure, he did very well at first, and that robbery of the old lord was not
ill-planned; but lately--"

"Nay, nay," quoth Augustus, interrupting the gigantic grumbler; "the
nature of man is prone to discontent. Allow that our present design of
setting up the gay Lothario, and trying our chances at Bath for an
heiress, is owing as much to Lovett's promptitude as to our invention."

"And what good will come of it?" returned Ned, as he lighted his pipe;
"answer me that. Was I not dressed as fine as a lord, and did not I walk
three times up and down that great room without being a jot the better
for it?"

"Ah! but you know not how many secret conquests you may have made. You
cannot win a prize by looking upon it."

"Humph!" grunted Ned, applying himself discontentedly to the young
existence of his pipe.

"As for the captain's partner," renewed Tomlinson, who maliciously