In _The Splendid Spur_, "Q." has given his Pegasus his head--(Queer
appearance this Pegasus with Q.'s head; but, as that's not my meaning, I
must mind my P's and Q's)--and has spared neither whip nor splendid spur
in his wild ride. Up behind, and clinging to "Q.," we are carried
onward, amid clashing of arms, booming of cannon, pealing of bells,
flashing of steel; anon we stumble over rocks, tumble over cliffs, hide
in secret caves, secrete ourselves, like mad Lord High Chancellors,
among Woolsacks; then after fainting, stabbing, dying, crying, sighing,
"JACK'S all alive again," and away we gallop, like DICK TURPIN on Black
Bess, and we leave girls dressed as boys behind us, and provincial JOANS
OF ARC going out fighting for Church and King; and then, just as we are
hanging suspended in mid-air over an awful precipice, there is a last
gallant effort, and we awake to find ourselves gasping for breath, and
awake to the fact that "Q.'s Pegasus" is a nightmare. It recalls
memories of LOUIS STEVENSON'S _Black Arrow_, but distances it by miles,
while here and there its vivid descriptions are equal to some of the
glowing pictures in SHORTHOUSE'S _John Inglesant_. The Baron hereby
recommends it as a stirring work for the novel-skipper in an idle hour.
By the way, it would be difficult, to say the least of it, to prove that
the slang phrase "shut up" and the Americanism "say" were never used in
A.D. 1642, in the sense in which they are used in 1890, but they are
scarcely characteristic of the modes of expression at that particular
period.