“It is no laughing matter,” he said, shifting the look of dislike to me.

“Sorry.”

“I might have been seriously injured.”

“Would you consider bunging another brick at the bird?”

“Do nothing of the sort. It will only annoy him.”

“Well, why not annoy him? He hasn’t shown such a dashed lot of consideration for our feelings.”

The Right Hon. now turned to another aspect of the matter.

“I cannot understand how my boat, which I fastened securely to the stump of a willow-tree, can have drifted away.”

“Dashed mysterious.”