"Without conversation we might as well be living in total solitude; and Bacon says, in one of his essays, that solitude is only fit for a god or a beast.

You may like being a beast, Major, but I don't.

You'll hardly set up, I suppose, to be a god." "Hang it all, J.J.! I've forgotten how many shillings I had to carry, and now I shall have to begin the whole tot over again." "Hand it out to me," said Meldon, "and I'll settle the whole thing for you in two minutes." "Certainly not," said the Major.

"I know your way of dealing with account books.

I may be slow, but I do like to be tidy." "Very well," said Meldon, "if you choose to be unsociable, merely in order to give yourself a lot of quite unnecessary trouble, of course you can.