By the way, Dick, you are something of a scholar--can you tell me what is understood by calling a man a _nullus_ ?" Admiral Bluewater, who had taken his usual lolling attitude in the most comfortable chair he could find, while his more mercurial friend kept pacing the room, now raised his head in surprise, following the quick motions of the other, with his eyes, as if he doubted whether he had rightly heard the question.
"It's plain English, is it not ?--or plain _Latin_, if you will--what is meant by calling a man a _nullus_ ?" repeated Sir Gervaise, observing the other's manner.
"The Latin is _plain_ enough, certainly," returned Bluewater, smiling; "you surely do not mean _nullus, nulla, nullum_ ?" "Exactly that--you've hit it to a gender .-- _Nullus_, nulla, nullum_.
No _man_, no _woman_, no _thing_.

Masculine, feminine, neuter." "I never heard the saying.

If ever used, it must be some silly play on sounds, and mean a numskull--or, perhaps, a fling at a fellow's position, by saying he is a 'nobody.' Who the deuce has been calling another a _nullus_, in the presence of the commander-in-chief of the southern squadron ?" "Sir Wycherly Wychecombe--our unfortunate host, here: the poor man who is on his death-bed, on this very floor." Again Bluewater raised his head, and once more his eye sought the face of his friend.

Sir Gervaise had now stopped short, with his hands crossed behind his back, looking intently at the other, in expectation of the answer.
"I thought it might be some difficulty from the fleet--some silly fellow complaining of another still more silly for using such a word.

Sir Wycherly!--the poor man's mind must have failed him." "I rather think not; if it has, there is 'method in his madness,' for he persevered most surprisingly, in the use of the term.