But his servants knew when anything weighed upon his spirits, by his fierce, short, maniacal temper.

But with the seal of that letter the spell broke, the evil spirit departed for a while, and the old jocose, laconic irony came back, and glittered whitely in the tall chair by the fire, and sipped its claret after dinner, and sometimes smoked its long pipe and grinned into the embers of the grate.

At Belmont, there had been a skirmish over the broiled drum-sticks at supper, and the ladies had withdrawn in towering passions to their nightly devotions and repose.
Gertrude had of late grown more like herself, but was quite resolute against the Dangerfield alliance, which Aunt Becky fought for, the more desperately that in their private confidences under the poplar trees she had given the rich cynic of the silver spectacles good assurance of success.
Puddock drank tea at Belmont--nectar in Olympus--that evening.

Was ever lieutenant so devoutly romantic?
He had grown more fanatical and abject in his worship.

He spoke less, and lisped in very low tones.