"Very true, Mr. Dodge; a country in which a man cannot shut himself, up in his room, whenever the notion seizes him. This is the spirit, Sir George, to make a great nation, and you see that the daughter is likely to prove worthy of the old lady! But, my dear sir, are you quite sure that Mr. John Effingham has absolutely so high a sentiment in his own favour. It would be awkward business to make a blunder in such a serious matter, and murder a paragraph for nothing. You should remember the mistake of the Irishman!" "What was that?" asked the baronet, who was completely mystified by the indomitable gravity of Captain Truck, whose character might be said to be actually formed by the long habit of treating the weaknesses of his fellow-creatures with cool contempt. "We hear many good things at our club; but I do not remember the mistake of the Irishman?" "He merely mistook the drumming in his own ear, for some unaccountable noise that disturbed his companions." Mr. Dodge felt uncomfortable; but there is no one in whom a vulgar-minded man stands so much in awe as an immovable quiz, who has no scruple in using his power. He shook his head, therefore, in a menacing manner, and affecting to have something to do he went below, leaving the baronet and captain by themselves. "Mr. Dodge is a stubborn friend of liberty," said the former, when his room-mate was out of hearing. "That is he, and you have his own word for it. He has no notion of letting a man do as he has a mind to! We are full of such active inquirers in America, and I don't care how many you shoot before you begin upon the white bears, Sir George." "But it would be more gracious in the Effinghams, you must allow, captain, if they shut themselves up in their cabin less, and admitted us to their society a little oftener. I am quite of Mr. Dodge's way of thinking, that exclusion is excessively odious." "There is a poor fellow in the steerage, Sir George, to whom I have given a piece of canvas to repair a damage to his mainsail, who would say the same thing, did he know of your six-and-thirtys. Take a cigar, my dear sir, and smoke away sorrow." "Thankee, captain: I never smoke. We never smoke at our club, though some of us go, at times, to the divan to try a chibouk." "We can't all have cabins to ourselves, or no one would live forward. If the Effinghams like their own apartment, I do honestly believe it is for a reason as simple as that it is the best in the ship. I'll warrant you, if there were a better, that they would be ready enough to change. I suppose when we get in, Mr. Dodge will honour you with an article in 'The Active Inquirer?'" "To own the truth, he has intimated some such thing." "And why not? A very instructive paragraph might be made about the six-and-thirty pair of breeches, and the patent razors, and the dressing-case, to say nothing of the Rocky Mountains, and the white bears."