This attractive person was always accompanied by a
formidable dog--of convex limbs, shrunken lip, and suspicious
demeanour--which he called Influenza, to the excessive amusement of
those to whom he related its characteristics. For some inexplicable
reason from the first it regarded my lower apparel as being unsuitable
for the ordinary occasions of life, and in spite of the low hissing
call by which its master endeavoured to attract its attention to
himself, it devoted its energies unceasingly to the self-imposed task
of removing them fragment by fragment. Nevertheless it was a dog of
favourable size and condition, and it need not therefore be a matter
for surprise that when the intellectual person Herbert took his
departure on the day in question it had to be assumed that it had
already preceded him. Having accomplished so much, this person found
little difficulty in preparing it tastefully in his own apartment,
and making the substitution on the following day.
Although his mind was confessedly enlarged at the success of his
venture, and his hopes most ornamentally coloured at the thought of
the adorable one's gratified esteem when she discovered how expertly
her wishes had been carried out, this person could not fail to notice
that the Maiden Blank was also materially agitated when she
distributed the contents of the dish before her.
"Will you, of your enlightened courtesy, accept, and overlook the
deficiencies of, a portion of rabbit-pie, O high-souled Mr.
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