“Yes, old lady.”

“And it makes a pretty and a promising picter; don’t it?”

“Yes, old lady.”

But, aware at the instant of a fine opening for a point, Mr. Boffin quenched that observation in this⁠—delivered in the grisliest growling of the regular brown bear. “A pretty and a hopeful picter? Mew, Quack quack, Bow-wow!” And then trotted silently downstairs, with his shoulders in a state of the liveliest commotion.