ROSE. Old, Major! You flatter my taste.
CLEVELAND. Why, with beauty I thought the conquest of the morning
stale matter by night.
ROSE. Oh, sir, if staleness went to make their age, they would be
proverbed instead of Methuselah.
CLEVELAND. They took very much to you.
ROSE. So did the measles, sir.
CLEVELAND. They are desperately enamoured of you--would do any
difficult thing--even die for you.
ROSE. So they once told me, but I courtesied, and replied that I
should prefer a live rebel to even two dead loyalists.
CLEVELAND. And then--
ROSE. They vowed to live for me. I begged of them to put themselves to
no such inconvenience; that I wouldn't trouble them to do anything
of the kind; that if they didn't think it worth while to live for
themselves, I shouldn't intrude upon any suicidal intention they might
entertain.
CLEVELAND. And so they lived--
ROSE. But I had no hand in it; I am innocent; my skirts are clear of
the melancholy fact.
CLEVELAND. They are noble gentlemen, Miss Elsworth. You must bear with
me if I defend them. They are good soldiers, and fine-looking fellows.
ROSE. For which I thank their tailors.
CLEVELAND. Gay, dashing; brave of heart, and witty of tongue.
ROSE. Then they have been studying the almanac. When I saw them last,
they hadn't a grain of wit--not even by scratching.
CLEVELAND. Really, Mr. Elsworth, your daughter has a sharp tongue.
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