Higher and higher were the capers that we cut; the moon repeated in shadow our antic footsteps and gestures; and it came over my mind of a sudden--really like balm--what appearance of man I was dancing with, what a long bilious countenance he had shown under his shaven pate, and what a world of trouble the rascal had given me in the immediate past.
Presently we began to see the lights of Bedford.

My Puritanic companion stopped and disengaged himself.
'This is a trifle _infra dig._, sir, is it not ?' said he.

'A party might suppose we had been drinking.' 'And so you shall be, Dudgeon,' said I.

'You shall not only be drinking, you old hypocrite, but you shall be drunk--dead drunk, sir--and the boots shall put you to bed! We'll warn him when we go in.

Never neglect a precaution; never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day!' But he had no more frivolity to complain of.