Things might 'look queer' again, you know." "That's all right.

I know a gentleman when I see him, unless I happen to lose my head, and that doesn't occur very often.

Now it's different with the governor.

He's got so confoundedly wrought up over that will, don't you know, that he can't think of anything else, and there's no reason in him." "As I understand it," remarked Scott, "Mr.Mainwaring expects to win the property in any case, either for you or for himself." "Yes; and naturally you might think that the loss of the will wouldn't amount to much, one way or the other; but it's like this: the governor and I are very different; I know we've got plenty of ducats, and that's enough for me, but not for him; he is ambitious.
It has always galled him that we were not in the direct line of descent from the main branch of the Mainwarings; and it has been his one great ambition since the death of old Ralph Mainwaring, Hugh's father, a few years before I was born, to win into his own family the old Mainwaring estate.

He had an idea that Hugh would never marry, and gave me his name, hoping that I would be made his heir.