"A musty, miserable pun! It was he, and I'm delighted it so happened,
that the first time he ever spoke to me he had to ask my pardon."

"Well, well! I'm glad it so happened, too, and that the ice is
broken between you, for Van Berg is a good friend of mine, and it
would be confoundedly disagreeable to have you two lowering at each
other across a bloody chasm of dark, revengeful thoughts."

"The ice isn't broken at all. He has begged my pardon as he ought
to do a hundred times; but I haven't granted it, and I never will.
What's more, I'll never speak to him in all my life; never, never!"

"Swear it by the 'inconstant moon'!"

"Hush, here he comes. Ah, 'peste!' his table is right opposite
ours."

"Who is that tall and rather distinguished-looking gentleman
that just entered?" asked Mrs. Mayhew, suddenly emerging from a
pre-occupation with her supper which a good appetite had induced.

"He IS distinguished, or will be. He's a particular friend of
Ida's, and is as rich as Croesus."

"Three items in his favor," said Mrs. Mayhew complacently; "but Ida
has so many friends, or beaux, rather, that I can't keep track of
them. Her friends speedily become furnace-like lovers, or else
escape for their lives into the dim and remote region of mere bowing
acquaintanceship. I once tried to keep a list of the various and
variegated gentlemen with red whiskers and black whiskers, with