"that I will not do any wrong to these young men if they live."

"Who asks you to do a wrong to them?--booby! Perhaps I may be the best
friend they may have yet--ay, or you too, though you're the ungratefulest
whimsicallist sort of a son of a gun that ever I came across. Come, help
yourself, and don't roll up your eyes in that way, like a Muggletonian
asoide of a Fye-Fye!"

Here the speaker paused a moment, and with a graver and more natural tone
of voice proceeded:

"So you did not believe me when I told you that these brothers were dead,
and you have been to the Mortons to learn more?"

"Yes."

"Well, and what have you learned?"

"Nothing. Morton declares that he does not know that they are alive, but
he says also that he does not know that they are dead."

"Indeed," said the other, listening with great attention; "and you really
think that he does not know anything about them?"

"I do, indeed."

"Hum! Is he a sort of man who would post down the rhino to help the
search?"

"He looked as if he had the yellow fever when I said I was poor,"