nced the action at a long range, and very
abruptly--for an effective rhetorician of Aunt Becky's sort, jumps at
once, like a good epic poet, _in medias res_; and as Nutter, who, like
all her friends in turn, experienced once or twice 'a taste of her
quality,' observed to his wife, 'by Jove, that woman says things for
which she ought to be put in the watch-house.' So now and here she
maintained her reputation--

'You ought to be flogged, Sir; yes,' she insisted, answering Puddock's
bewildered stare, 'tied up to the halberts and flogged.'

Aunt Rebecca was accompanied by at least half a dozen lap-dogs, and
those intelligent brutes, aware of his disgrace, beset poor Puddock's
legs with a furious vociferation.

'Madam,' said he, his ears tingling, and making a prodigious low bow;
'commissioned officers are never flogged.'

'So much the worse for the service, Sir; and the sooner they abolish
that anomalous distinction the better. I'd have them begin, Sir, with
you, and your accomplice in murder, Lieutenant O'Flaherty.'

'Madam! your most obedient humble servant,' said Puddock, with another
bow, still more ceremonious, flushing up intensely to the very roots of
his powdered hair, and feeling in his swelling heart that all the
generals of all the armies of Europe dare not have held such language to
him.

'Good-evening, Sir,' said Aunt Becky, with an energetic toss of her
head, having discharged her shot; and with an averted countenance, and
in high disdain, she swept grandly on, quite forgetting her niece, who
said a pleasant word or two to Puddock as she passed, and smiled so
kindly, and seemed so entirely unconscious of his mortification, that he
was quite consoled, and on the whole was made happy and elated by the
rencontre, and went home to his wash-balls and perfumes in a hopeful and
radiant, though somewhat excited state.

Indeed, the little lieutenant knew that kind-hearted termagant, Aunt
Becky, too well, to be long cast down or even flurried by her onset.
When the same little Puddock, about a year ago, had that ugly attack of
pleurisy, and was so low and so long about recovering, and so puny and
fastidious in appetite, she treated him as kindly as if he were her own
son, in the matter of jellies, strong soups, and curious light wines,
and had afterwards lent him some good books which the little lieutenant
had read through, like a man of honour as he was. And, indeed, what
specially piqued Aunt Becky's resentme