"
"I perceive, gentlemen, that we do not perfectly understand each other,
and I must postpone the discussion to a more favourable opportunity; for I
confess great uneasiness at this decision of the captain's, about steering
in among the rocks of Sylla." (Mr. Dodge was not as clear-headed as
common, in consequence of the controversy that had just occurred.) "I
challenge you to renew the subject another time, gentlemen. I only
happened in" (another peculiarity of diction in this gentleman) "to make a
first call, for I suppose there is no exclusion in an American ship?"
"None whatever, sir," Mr. John Effingham coldly answered. "All the
state-rooms are in common, and I propose to seize an early occasion to
return this compliment, by making myself at home in the apartment which
has the honour to lodge Mr. Dodge and Sir George Templemore."
Here Mr. Dodge beat a retreat, without touching at all on his real errand.
Instead of even following up the matter with the other passengers, he got
into a corner, with one or two congenial spirits, who had taken great
offence that the Effinghams should presume to retire into their cabin, and
particularly that they should have the extreme aristocratical audacity to
shut the door, where he continued pouring into the greedy ears of his
companions his own history of the recent dialogue, in which, according to
his own account of the matter, he had completely gotten the better of that
"young upstart, Blunt," a man of whom he knew positively nothing, divers
anecdotes of the Effingham family, that came of the lowest and most idle
gossip of rustic malignancy, and his own vague and confused notions of the
rights of persons and of things.
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