imitate your friend and waive advantage!'

"Twenty-five
Years ago this matter happened: and 'tis certain," added Clive,
"Never, to my knowledge, did Sir Cocky have a single breath
Breathed against him: lips were closed throughout his life, or
since his death,
For if he be dead or living I can tell no more than you.
All I know is--Cocky had one chance more; how he used it,--grew
Out of such unlucky habits, or relapsed, and back again
Brought the late-ejected devil with a score more in his train,--
That's for you to judge. Reprieval I procured, at any rate.
Ugh--the memory of that minute's fear makes gooseflesh rise! Why prate
Longer? You've my story, there's your instance: fear I did, you see!"

"Well"--I hardly kept from laughing--"if I see it, thanks must be
Wholly to your Lordship's candor. Not that--in a common case--
When a bully caught at cheating thrusts a pistol in one's face,
I should underrate, believe me, such a trial to the nerve!
'Tis no joke, at one-and-twenty, for a youth to stand nor swerve.
Fear I naturally look for--unless, of all men alive,
I am forced to make exception when I come to Robert Clive.
Since at Arcot, Plassy, elsewhere, he and death--the whole world
knows--
Came to somewhat closer quarters."
Quarters? Had we come to blows,
Clive and I, you had not wondered--up he sprang so, out he rapped
Such a round of oaths--no matter! I'll endeavor to adapt
To our modern usage words he--well, 'twas friendly license--flung
At me like so many fire-balls, fast as he could wag his tongue.

"You--a soldier? You--at Plassy? Yours the faculty to nick
Instantaneously occasion when your foe, if lightning-quick,
--At his mercy, at his malice,--has you, through some stupid inch
Undefended in your bulwark? Thus laid open,--not to flinch
--That needs courage, you'll concede me. Then, look here! Suppose
the man,
Checking his advance, his weapon still extended, not a span
Distant from my temple,--curse him!--quietly had bade me 'There!
Keep your life, calumniator!--worthless life I freely spare:
Mine you freely would have taken--murdered me and my good fame
Both at once--and all the better! Go, and thank your own bad aim
Which permits me to forgive you!' What if