What have I to do with such fellows?
John Bull, after all his losses and crosses, can live better without them than they can without him.

Would I lived a thousand leagues off them! but the devil's in it; John Bull is in, and John Bull must get out as well as he can." As he was talking to himself, he observed Frog and old Lewis edging towards one another to whisper,* so that John was forced to sit with his arms akimbo, to keep them asunder.
* Some attempts of secret negotiation between the French and the Dutch.
Some people advised John to bleed Frog under the tongue, or take away his bread-and-butter, which would certainly make him speak; to give Esquire South hellebore; as for Lewis, some were for emollient poultices, others for opening his arm with an incision knife..