' And having given utterance to
this retort, Mr Willet fixed his eyes upon the boiler, and fell into a
kind of tobacco-trance.
The spirits of the company being somewhat damped by this embarrassing
line of conduct on the part of their host, nothing more was said for a
long time; but at length Mr Cobb took upon himself to remark, as he rose
to knock the ashes out of his pipe, that he hoped Joe would thenceforth
learn to obey his father in all things; that he had found, that day, he
was not one of the sort of men who were to be trifled with; and that
he would recommend him, poetically speaking, to mind his eye for the
future.
'I'd recommend you, in return,' said Joe, looking up with a flushed
face, 'not to talk to me.'
'Hold your tongue, sir,' cried Mr Willet, suddenly rousing himself, and
turning round.
'I won't, father,' cried Joe, smiting the table with his fist, so that
the jugs and glasses rung again; 'these things are hard enough to bear
from you; from anybody else I never will endure them any more. Therefore
I say, Mr Cobb, don't talk to me.'
'Why, who are you,' said Mr Cobb, sneeringly, 'that you're not to be
talked to, eh, Joe?'
To which Joe returned no answer, but with a very ominous shake of the
head, resumed his old position, which he would have peacefully preserved
until the house shut up at night, but that Mr Cobb, stimulated by the
wonder of the company at the young man's presumption, retorted with
sundry taunts, which proved too much for flesh and blood to bear.
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