"Wilt thou chop logic with me," said Lambourne, "thou knave, with no
more brains than are in a skein of ravelled silk? By Heaven, I will cut
thee into fifty yards of galloon lace!"
But as he attempted to draw his sword for this doughty purpose, Michael
Lambourne was seized upon by the tapster and the chamberlain, and
conveyed to his own apartment, there to sleep himself sober at his
leisure.
The party then broke up, and the guests took their leave; much more
to the contentment of mine host than of some of the company, who were
unwilling to quit good liquor, when it was to be had for free cost, so
long as they were able to sit by it. They were, however, compelled to
remove; and go at length they did, leaving Gosling and Tressilian in the
empty apartment.
"By my faith," said the former, "I wonder where our great folks find
pleasure, when they spend their means in entertainments, and in playing
mine host without sending in a reckoning. It is what I but rarely
practise; and whenever I do, by Saint Julian, it grieves me beyond
measure. Each of these empty stoups now, which my nephew and his drunken
comrades have swilled off, should have been a matter of profit to one in
my line, and I must set them down a dead loss. I cannot, for my heart,
conceive the pleasure of noise, and nonsense, and drunken freaks, and
drunken quarrels, and smut, and blasphemy, and so forth, when a man
loses money instead of gaining by it. And yet many a fair estate is lost
in upholding such a useless course, and that greatly contributes to the
decay of publicans; for who the devil do you think would pay for drink
at the Black Bear, when he can have it for nothing at my Lord's or the
Squire's?"
Tressilian perceived that the wine had made some impression even on the
seasoned brain of mine host, which was chiefly to be inferred from his
declaiming against drunkenness. As he himself had carefully avoided the
bowl, he would have availed himself of the frankness of the moment
to extract from Gosling some further information upon the subject
of Anthony Foster, and the lady whom the mercer had seen in his
mansion-house; but his inquiries only set the host upon a new theme of
declamation against the wiles of the fair sex, in which he brought, at
full length, the whole wisdom of Solomon to reinforce his own. Finally,
he turned his admonitions, mixed with much objurgation, upon his
tapsters and drawers, who were employed in removing the relics of the
entertainment, and restoring order to the apartment; and at length,
joining example to precept, though with no good success, he demolished
a salver with half a score of glasses, in attempting to show how such
service was done at the Three Cranes in the Vintry, then the most
topping tavern in London. This last accident so far recalled him to his
better self, that he retired to his bed, slept sound, and awoke a new
man in the morning.