The thing goes so far that I have occasionally mistaken my wife's
relations for old friends. Then, when I am hostile, it is just as bad.
I never, indeed, horsewhipped the wrong man, but that is only because
I never horsewhipped anybody at all, Heaven forefend! But _once_ I did
mean to cut a man, I forget why. So I cut the wrong man, a harmless
acquaintance whose feelings I would not have hurt for the world.
Of course I accidentally cut all the world. Some set it down to an
irritable temper, and ask, "What can we have done to The MACDUFFER?"
Others think I am proud. Proud! I ask, what has a Duffer to be proud
of? Nobody, or very few, admit that I am just a Duffer; a stupid,
short-sighted, absent-minded child of misfortune.
All these things do not make my life so pleasant to me that I, the
MACDUFFER, should greatly care to dine out. Ah, that _is_ a trial.
First, I never know my host and hostess by sight. Next, in a summer
dusk, I never know anybody. Then, as to conversation, I have none.
My mind is always prowling about on some antiquarian hobby-horse,
reflecting deeply on the Gowrie Conspiracy, or the Raid of Ruthven, or
the chances in favour of PERKIN WARBECK's having been a true man.
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