“Kill you!” said Sir Willoughby, quite aghast. “Yes; kill me! is it not quite cold enough already in this d--d seafaring place, without making my only retreat, humble as it is, a theatre for thorough draughts? Have I not had the rheumatism in my left shoulder, and the ague in my little finger, these last six months? and must you now terminate my miserable existence at one blow, by opening that abominable lattice? Do you think, because your great frame, fresh from the Yorkshire wolds, and compacted of such materials, that one would think, in eating your beeves, you had digested their hides into skin--do you think, because your limbs might be cut up into planks for a seventy-eight, and warranted water-proof without pitch, because of the density of their pores--do you think, because you are as impervious as an araphorostic shoe, that I, John Russelton, am equally impenetrable, and that you are to let easterly winds play about my room like children, begetting rheums and asthmas and all manner of catarrhs? I do beg, Sir Willoughby Townshend, that you will suffer me to die a more natural and civilized death;” and so saying, Russelton sank down into his chair, apparently in the last state of exhaustion. Sir Willoughby, who remembered the humourist in all his departed glory, and still venerated him as a temple where the deity yet breathed, though the altar was overthrown, made to this extraordinary remonstrance no other reply than a long whiff, and a “Well, Russelton, dash my wig (a favourite oath of Sir W.’s) but you’re a queer fellow.” Russelton now turned to me, and invited me, with a tone of the most lady-like languor, to sit down near the fire. As I am naturally of a chilly disposition, and fond, too, of beating people in their own line, I drew a chair close to the hearth, declared the weather was very cold, and rung the bell for some more wood. Russelton started for a moment, and then, with a politeness he had not deigned to exert before, approached his chair to mine, and began a conversation, which, in spite of his bad witticisms, and peculiarity of manner, I found singularly entertaining. Dinner was announced, and we adjourned to another room--poor Sir Willoughby, with his waistcoat unbuttoned, and breathing like a pug in a phthisis--groaned bitterly, when he discovered that this apartment was smaller and hotter than the one before. Russelton immediately helped him to some scalding soup--and said, as he told the servant to hand Sir Willoughby the cayenne--“you will find this, my dear Townshend, a very sensible potage for this severe season.” Dinner went off tamely enough, with the exception of “our stout friend’s” agony, which Russelton enjoyed most luxuriously. The threatened mutton-chops did not make their appearance, and the dinner, though rather too small, was excellently cooked, and better arranged. With the dessert, the poor baronet rose, and pleading sudden indisposition, tottered out of the door.