apple
Dumpling travels so slowly."

"This trifling is impertinent," exclaimed the knight angrily: "to your
business."

"I hope it wo'n't end in smoke, as it begins in fire," replied Robin,
slily presenting a roll of the tobacco vulgarly called pig-tail.

"Mis-shapen wretch!" retorted Burrell in a towering passion, flinging
the roll directly in his face, "how dare you to trifle thus with your
superiors? art drunk, or mad?"

"Neither, an please ye, Sir Willmott," replied Robin, replacing the
tobacco in his bosom; "only since you wo'n't look into the pig-tail,
perhaps you will tell me what I am to say to Hugh Dalton."

"Hugh Dalton! There, give it me; why did you not tell me you came from
the Buccaneer? Robin, you are a million times worse than a fool! There,
sit, good Robin--But, no, light me yon lamp; the fire burns dimly. A
murrain on't, I can't see! There, that will do."

While Burrell read Dalton's communication, thus whimsically but
carefully conveyed, Robin had ample time to moralise on and observe all
around him.

"That table," thought the Ranger, "is just a type of the times. The
Bible, it can hardly be seen for the heap of foolish expositions, and
preachments, in the shape of pamphlets, that crowd upon it. O, Lord! O,
Lord! take from the Puritans their vain opinions, wild imaginations,
false valuations, and the like, which they hang over the book that
Barbara says has so much good in it (just as the Catholics at San
Eustatia trick out the Saviour's figure), and what poor shrunken minds
they'd have! Then the bottle and glass: that, I'm afraid, typifies the
Cavalier; the poor Cavalier! who clings so firmly to the worn, and lets
go the stronger, rope. But mark how the filthy liquor stands beside the
pure book!--even so are the just and the unjust mingled. Ah! he has been
praying with the Lords' Commissioners; then drinking, and so forth, the
instant their backs were turned! Yet, God hath made the double-faced
villain of good proportions, so that a woman can look on him with love,
though his heart--augh!--I wouldn't have his heart for his lands, no,
nor for his fine person either. Barbara can't abide him; she always says
he has a black look--and so he has. But hark! there's knocking at the
gate, and loud knocking too--Sir Willmott, as the servants can't hear,
so can't answer, shall I go down?"

Burrell was so much occupied with his letter, that he heard neither the
knocking nor Robin's question, but sat, hi