u answer my question?

Hum. Because, if I contradict you, I shall tell you a lie, and whenever I
agree with you, you are sure to fall out.

Sir R. Humphrey Dobbins. I have been so long endeavoring to beat a few
brains into your pate that all your hair has tumbled off before my point
is carried.

Hum. What then? Our parson says my head is an emblem of both our honors.

Sir R. Ay; because honors, like your head, are apt to be empty.

Hum. No; but if a servant has grown bald under his master's nose, it looks
as if there was honesty on one side, and regard for it on the other.

Sir R. Why, to be sure, old Humphrey, you are as honest as a--pshaw! the
parson means to palaver us; but, to return to my position, I tell you I do
n't like your flat contradiction.

Hum. Yes, you do.

Sir R. I tell you I don't. I only love to hear men's arguments. I hate
their flummery.

Hum. What do you call flummery?

Sir R. Flattery, blockhead! a dish too often served up by paltry poor men
to paltry rich ones.

Hum. I never serve it up to you.

Sir R. No, you give me a dish of a different description.

Hum. Hem! what is it?

Sir R. Sauerkraut, you old crab

Hum. I have held you a stout tug at argument this many a year.

Sir R. And yet I could never teach you a syllogism. Now mind, when a poor
man assents to what a rich man says, I suspect he means to flatter him:
now I am rich, and hate flattery. Ergo--when a poor man subscribes to my
opinion, I hate him.

Hum. That's wrong.

Sir R. Very well; negatur; now prove it.

Hum. Put the case then, I am a poor man.

Sir R. You an't, you scoundrel. You know you shall never want while I have
a shilling.

Hum. Bless you!

Sir R. Pshaw! Proceed.

Hum. Well, then, I am a poor--I must be a poor man now, or I never shall
get on.

Sir R. Well, get on, be a poor man.

Hum. I am a poor man, and I argue with you, and convince you, you are
wrong; then you call yourself a blockhead, and I am of your opinion: now,
that's no flattery.

Sir R. Why, no; but when a man's of the same opinion with me, he puts an
end to the argument, and that puts an end to the conversation, and so I
hate him for that. But where's my nephew Frederic?

Hum. Been out these two hours.

Sir R. An undutiful cub! Only arrived from Russia last night, and though I
told him to stay at home till I rose, he's scampering over the fields like
a Calmuck Tartar.

Hum. He's a fine fellow.

Sir R. He has a touch of