"It is necessary, Bonker--you are sure ?" "No Tulliwuddle has ever omitted the ceremony.

If you shirked, I am assured on the very best authority that it would excite the gravest suspicions of your authenticity." Count Bunker spoke with an air of the most resolute conviction.

Ever since they arrived he had taken infinite pains to discover precisely what was expected of the chieftain, and having by great good luck made the acquaintance of an elderly individual who claimed to be the piper of the clan, and who proved a perfect granary of legends, he was able to supply complete information on every point of importance.

Once the Baron had endeavored to corroborate these particulars by interviewing the piper himself, but they had found so much difficulty in understanding one another's dialects that he had been content to trust implicitly to his friend's information.

The Count, indeed, had rather avoided than sought advice on the subject, and the piper, after several confidential conversations and the passage of a sum of silver into his sporran, displayed an equally Delphic tendency.
The Baron, therefore, argued the present point no longer.
"It is jost a mere ceremony," he said.