The Works of George W. M. Reynolds — page 389: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

312 REYNOLDS’ WORKS the burglars had entered the premises, seemed to warrant this mode of dealing with it. Chiffin, we need hardly say, was an accomplished hand in using the crowbar for such purposes, and made little noise in the process. The door speedily yielded, a few more efforts, and it was broken com- pletely open. The burglars passed into the place, which, as Chiffin had anticipated, proved to be the butler’s pantry. But infinite was their disappointment when, after searching in every cupboard, they found no plate there. “This is deuced provoking,’ growled the Cannibal, in a feroclous manner. ‘“Cussed mean of the people of the ’ouse to take their plate up to-bed with ’em,”’ remarked Tony Wilkins. ‘“‘ It ain’t giving a poor devil a fair chance,’’ he added, with the look of a man who fancied that he was cruelly wronged. ‘“ What’s to be done now? ”’ “ What’s to be done? ’’ echoed the Cannibal, in a voice which resembled the subdued grumblings of a hungry tiger, “why, hunt about for the swag till we find it, to be sure. And if a throat or two 1s to be cut in the search, what matters ber ‘“ Nuffin at all,’’? responded Tony Wilkins. ‘“ Lead on, old feller. You seems to know your way as if by instinct, as they say of the ’osses.”’ Chiffin the Cannibal passed out of the butler’s pantry, and proceeded into the front kitchen, but nothing worthy of his predatory views was found there. Thence the burglars proceeded into the servants’ hall, where some four or five stray silver forks and spoons, which the butler had doubtless forgotten to count up along with the rest of the plate, were lving about. “This is summut, at all events,’ observed Tony Wilkins. ‘It cheers one on to look arter more.’’ “ Now, then, keep that cursed tongue of yours still, and pull off them great heavy boots of yourn,” said Chiffin, “ or else do as I do, 1£ you have got the things to do it with.”. And what was it that Chiffin the Cannibal was now doing? Nothing more nor less than drawing on a very coarse pair of lamb’s wool socks over his own thick and heavy lace-up boots. This being done, he took a pair of pistols from his pocket, saw that each had a percussion-cap ready for service, and, handing one to Tony Wilkins, bade him only use it in CONNIE CKO KS (E(0)