I Extricated Myself From His Clutches And Endeavored To Make My
Retreat; But I Was Confounded By His Cries Of Thieves!
And robbers!
I
was bothered, too, by his Sunday cane; which was amazingly busy about
my head as I descended; and against which my hat was but a poor
protection. Never before had I an idea of the activity of an old man's
arm, and hardness of the knob of an ivory-headed cane. In my hurry and
confusion I missed my footing, and fell sprawling on the pavement. I
was immediately surrounded by myrmidons, who I doubt not were on the
watch for me. Indeed, I was in no situation to escape, for I had
sprained my ankle in the fall, and could not stand. I was seized as a
housebreaker; and to exonerate myself from a greater crime I had to
accuse myself of a less. I made known who I was, and why I came there.
Alas! the varlets knew it already, and were only amusing themselves at
my expense. My perfidious muse had been playing me one of her slippery
tricks. The old curmudgeon of a father had found my sonnets and
acrostics hid away in holes and corners of his shop; he had no taste
for poetry like his daughter, and had instituted a rigorous though
silent observation. He had moused upon our letters; detected the ladder
of ropes, and prepared everything for my reception. Thus was I ever
doomed to be led into scrapes by the muse.
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