 difficult to divine
the whole mystery; and affecting to deplore the poor lady, as if she was exposed
to more attempts of the same nature; thereby glancing obliquely at the innocent
commodore, whom the officious son of Æsculapius suspected as the author of this
expedient, to rid his hands of a yoke-fellow, for whom he was well known to have
no great devotion. This impertinent and malicious insinuation made some
impression upon the by-standers, and furnished ample field for slander, to
asperse the morals of Trunnion, who was represented through the whole district
as a monster of barbarity. Nay, the sufferer herself, though she behaved with
great decency and prudence, could not help entertaining some small diffidence of
her husband: not that she imagined he had any design upon her life, but that he
had been at pains to adulterate the brandy, with the view of detaching her from
that favourite liquor.
    On this supposition she resolved to act with more caution for the future,
without setting on foot any inquiry about the affair; while the commodore
imputing her indisposition to some natural cause, after the danger was past,
never bestowed a thought upon the subject, so that the perpetrators were quit
for their fear, which, however, had punished them so effectually, that they
never would hazard any more jokes of the same nature.
 

                                   Chapter XV

The Triumvirate turn the Stream of their Wit upon the Commodore, who by their
Means is embroiled with an Attorney, and terrified with an Apparition
 
The shafts of their wit were now directed against the commander himself, whom
they teized and terrified almost out of his senses. One day while he was at
dinner, Pipes came and told him that there was a person below that wanted to
speak with him immediately about an affair of the greatest importance, that
would admit of no delay; upon which he ordered the stranger to be told that he
was engaged, and that he must send up his name and business. To this demand he
received for answer a message, importing that the person's name was unknown to
him, and his business of such a nature, that it could not be disclosed to any
one but the commodore himself, whom he earnestly desired to see without loss of
time.
    Trunnion, surprised at this importunity, got up with great reluctance in the
middle of his meal, and descending to a parlour where the stranger was, asked in
a surly tone what he wanted with him in such a damned hurry, that he could not
wait till he had made an end of his mess. The other, not at all disconcerted at
this rough
