'
'Well, and did not the laughter they fell into at his absence of mind,
serve better to break off the dispute than anything he could have said
to them?'
'True, my dear,' answered Flora; 'but not quite so creditably for
Waverley as if he had brought them to their senses by force of reason.'
'Would you have him peacemaker general between all the gunpowder
Highlanders in the army? I beg your pardon, Flora--your brother, you
know, is out of the question; he has more sense than half of them. But
can you think the fierce, hot, furious spirits, of whose brawls we see
much, and hear more, and who terrify me out of my life every day in the
world, are at all to be compared to Waverley?'
'I do not compare him with those uneducated men, my dear Rose. I only
lament, that, with his talents and genius, he does not assume that place
in society for which they eminently fit him, and that he does not lend
their full impulse to the noble cause in which he has enlisted. Are
there not Lochiel, and P--, and M--, and G--, all men of the highest
education, as well as the first talents?--why will he not stoop like
them to be alive and useful?--I often believe his zeal is frozen by that
proud cold-blooded Englishman, whom he now lives with so much.
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