lings you excited. I love Patience better than my life."

"Since you put it in that light," rejoined Pillichody, "I am willing to
overlook the offence. Snakes and scorpions! no man can be a greater
martyr to jealousy than myself. I killed three of my most intimate
friends for merely presuming to ogle the widow of Watling-street, who
would have been mine, if she had not died of the plague."

"Don't talk of the plague, I beseech you," replied Blaize, with a
shudder. "It is a subject never mentioned here."

"I am sorry I alluded to it, then," rejoined Pillichody. "Give me back
my sword. Nay, fear nothing. I entirely forgive you, and am willing to
drown the remembrance of our quarrel in a bottle of sack."

Readily assenting to the proposition, Blaize obtained the key of the
cellar from the butler, and adjourning thither with Pillichody, they
seated themselves on a cask with a bottle of sack and a couple of large
glasses on a stool between them.

"I suppose you know why I am come hither?" observed the major, smacking
his lips after his second bumper.

"Not precisely," replied Blaize. "But I presume your visit has some
reference to Mistress Amabel."

"A shrewd guess," rejoined Pillichody. "And this reminds me that we have
omitted to drink her health."

"Her better health," returned Blaize, emptying his glass. "Heaven be
praised! she has plucked up a little since we came here."

"She would soon be herself again if she were united to the Earl of
Rochester," said Pillichody.

"There you are wrong," replied Blaize. "She declares she has no longer
any regard for him."

"Mere caprice, believe me," rejoined Pillichody. "She loves him better
than ever."

"It may be so," returned Blaize; "for Patience, who ought to know
something of the matter, assured me she was dying for the earl; and if
she had not told me the contrary herself, I should not have believed
it."

"Did she tell you so in the presence of Leonard?" asked Pillichody.

"Why, now I bethink me, he _was_ present," replied Blaize, involuntarily
putting his hand to his shoulder, as he recalled the horsewhipping he
had received on that occasion.

"I knew it!" cried Pillichody. "She is afraid to confess her attachment
to the earl. Is Leonard as much devoted to her as ever?"

"I fancy so," replied Blaize, "but she certainly gives _him_ no
encouragement."

"Confirmation!" exclaimed Pillichody. "But fill your glass. We will
drink to the earl's speedy union with