"
"I have read all about that in 'Keysler's Travels,'" said I; "do
you tell her that I would not touch her with a pair of tongs,
unless to seize her nose."
"She is fond of lucre," said the man in black; "but does not grudge
a faithful priest a little private perquisite," and he took out a
very handsome gold repeater.
"Are you not afraid," said I, "to flash that watch before the eyes
of a poor tinker in a dingle?"
"Not before the eyes of one like you," said the man in black.
"It is getting late," said I; "I care not for perquisites."
"So you will not join us?" said the man in black.
"You have had my answer," said I.
"If I belong to Rome," said the man in black, "why should not you?"
"I may be a poor tinker," said I; "but I may never have undergone
what you have. You remember, perhaps, the fable of the fox who had
lost his tail?"
The man in black winced, but almost immediately recovering himself,
he said, "Well, we can do without you, we are sure of winning."
"It is not the part of wise people," said I, "to make sure of the
battle before it is fought: there's the landlord of the public-
house, who made sure that his cocks would win, yet the cocks lost
the main, and the landlord is little better than a bankrupt."
"People very different from the landlord," said the man in black,
"both in intellect and station, think we shall surely win; there
are clever machinators among us who have no doubt of our success.
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