The group braced up a little at the sound of his heroic words.
"But the derned thing's round," was the only thing Ed Higgins could find to say.

Ed, as fickle as the wind, was once more deeply in love with Rosalie, having switched from Miss Banks immediately after the visit to Colonel Randall's.
"Aw, you go to Guinea!" was Blootch's insulting reply.

Nothing could be more disparaging than that, but Ed failed to retaliate.

"Let's appoint a committee to wait on Anderson and find out what he thinks we'd better do." "But Anderson ain't--" began some one.

Blootch calmly waived him into silence.
"What he wants is encouragement, and not a lot of soup and broth and lemonade.