It is sometimes becoming enough for a man to wrap himself in the dignified toga of silence, and proclaim himself indifferent to public attacks; but it is a sort of dignity which it is very difficult to maintain.

As well might a man, when stung to madness by wasps, endeavour to sit in his chair without moving a muscle, as endure with patience and without reply the courtesies of a newspaper opponent.

Dr Thorne wrote a third letter, which was too much for medical flesh and blood to bear.

Dr Fillgrave answered it, not, indeed, in his own name, but in that of a brother doctor; and then the war raged merrily.

It is hardly too much to say that Dr Fillgrave never knew another happy hour.