He is a damned scoundrel, and squeezed his tithes out of the people with pincers of blood." "Manifold, your gluttony has brought you to a fine pass.

Are you alive or not ?" "Eh?
Curse all dry toast and water! But it's all the consequence of this year of famine.

Pray, sir, what do you eat ?" "Beef, mutton, venison, fowl, ham, turbot, salmon, black sole, with all the proper and corresponding sauces and condiments." "O Lord! and no toast and water, beef tea, and oatmeal gruel?
Heavens! how I wish this year of famine was past.

It will be the death of me.
I say, what's this your name is?
Your face is familiar to me somehow.
Could you aid me in poisoning the--the--what you call him--ay, the doctor ?" "Nothing more easily done, my dear Manifold.

Contrive to let him take one of his own doses, and he's done for." "Wouldn't ratsbane do?
I often think he's a rat." "In face and eyes he certainly looks very like one." "Are you aware, sir, that my wife's a cripple?
She's paralyzed in her lower limbs." "I am perfectly aware of that melancholy fact." "Are you aware that she's jealous of me ?" "No, not that she's jealous of you now; but perfectly aware that she had good cause to be so." "Ay, but the devil of it is that the paralysis you speak of never reached her tongue." "I speak of--'twas yourself spoke of it." "She sent me here because it happens to be a year of famine--what is commonly called a hard season--and she stitched the little blasted doctor to me that I might die legitimately under medical advice.