words;
for, to tell you the truth, I am greatly afraid of his hot and hasty
temper."

"There is nothing hot or hasty about him, ma'am," replied Robinson; "he
is about as peaceable a man as you mought expect to meet in such times
as these. I only told him a little scrap of news, and you would have
thought he would have hugged me for it, ha, ha, ha."

"We are to sleep in the same room, sergeant," said Butler, "and our good
hostess will show us the way to it."

The dame, upon this hint, took a candle, and conducted her guests to a
chamber in the upper story, where, after wishing them "a good night,"
she courtesied respectfully, and left them to their repose.

"Tell me, sergeant, what you made out of that fellow," said Butler, as
he undressed himself. "I see that you have had some passage with him;
and, from your tarrying so long, I began to be a little apprehensive of
rough work between you. What passed, and what have you learned?"

"Enough, major, to make us more circumscriptious against scouts, and
spies, and stratagems. When I was a prisoner at Charlestown, there was
an amazing well-built fellow, a dragoon, that had been out with
Tarleton; but, when I saw him, he was a sort of rithmatical
account-keeper and letter-scribbler for that young fighting-cock, the
Earl of Caithness, him that was aidegong to Sir Henry Clinton. Well,
this fellow had a tolerable bad name, as being a chap that the devil had
spiled, in spite of all the good that had been pumped into him at
school; for, as I have hearn, he was come of gentle people, had a first
rate edication, and I reckon, now, major, he talks as well as a book,
whereupon I have an observation."

"Keep that until to-morrow, sergeant," interrupted Butler, "and go on
with what you had to tell me."

"You must be a little sleepy, major: however, this fellow, they say, was
cotched cheating with cards one day, when he was playing a game of five
shilling loo with the King or the Queen, or some of the dukes or
colonels in the guards--for he wa'n't above any thing rascally. So, it
was buzzed about, as you may suppose when a man goes to cheating one of
them big fish--and the King gave him his choice to enlist, or go to the
hulks; and he, being no fool, listed, as a matter of course. In that way
he got over here; and, as I tell you, was a sort of sarvent to that
young Earl. He sometimes came about our quarters to list prisoners and
make Tories of 'em, for his own people kept him to do