your legs in motion.

_Pon._ Then, sir, I have really been thinking, ever since I saw you,
that you are a little--(_going off to a distance_) a little _odd_
hereabouts, sir; (_pointing to his head_) a little damned mad, if I may
be allowed the expression!

_Char._ Ha! ha! very probably. My sudden return, without a motive, as
you suppose, has put that wise notion in your head.

_Pon._ Without a motive! No, sir, I believe I know tolerably well the
motive--the old story, sir, ha! love!

_Char._ Love! And pray, sirrah, how do you dare to presume to suppose,
that I--that I can be guilty of such a folly--I should be glad to know
how you dare venture to think that I----

_Pon._ Lord bless you, sir, I discovered it before you left the country.

_Char._ Indeed! and by what symptoms, pray?

_Pon._ The old symptoms, sir--in the first place, frequent fits of my
complaint.

_Char._ _Your_ complaint?

_Pon._ Yes, thinking, long reveries, sudden starts, sentimental sighs,
fits of unobserving absence, fidgets and fevers, orders and counter
orders, loss of memory, loss of appetite, loss of rest, and loss of your
senses, if I may be allowed the expression.

_Char._ No, sir, you may not be allowed the expression--'tis
impertinent, 'tis false. I never was unobserving or absent; I never had
the fidgets; I never once mentioned the name of my adored Helen; and,
heigho! I never sighed for her in my life!

_Pon._ Nor I, sir; though I've been married these three years, I never
once sighed for my dear wife in all that time--heigho!

_Char._ I mustn't be angry with the fellow. Why, I took you for an
unobserving blockhead, or I would never have trusted you so near me.

_Pon._ Then, sir, you _mis_-took me. I fancy it was in one of your most
decided unobserving fits that you took _me_ for a blockhead.

_Char._ Well, sir; I see you have discovered my secret. Act wisely, and
it may be of service to you.

_Pon._ Sir, I haven't studied the law for nothing. I'm no fool, if I may
be allowed the expression.

_Char._ I begin to suspect you have penetration enough to be useful to
me.

_Pon._ And craving your pardon, sir, I begin to suspect your want of
that faculty, from your not having found out that before.

_Char._ I will now trust you, although once my servant, with the state
of my heart.

_Pon._ Sir, that's very kind of you, to trust your humble servant with a
_secret_ he had himself discovered ten months ago.

_Char._ Keep it