so, Mr. Hempseed?” inquired the stranger politely.
“Nay, sir!” replied Mr. Hempseed, much irritated, “I dunno as I can give you the information you require.”
“Faith, then,” said the stranger, “let us hope, my worthy host, that these clever spies will not succeed in upsetting your extremely loyal opinions.”
But this was too much for Mr. Jellyband’s pleasant equanimity. He burst into an uproarious fit of laughter, which was soon echoed by those who happened to be in his debt.
“Hahaha! hohoho! hehehe!” He laughed in every key, did my worthy host, and laughed until his sides ached, and his eyes streamed. “At me! hark at that! Did ye ‘ear ‘im say that they’d be upsettin’ my opinions?—Eh?—Lud love you, sir, but you do say some queer things.”
“Well, Mr. Jellyband,” said Mr. Hempseed, sententiously, “you know what the Scriptures say: ‘Let ‘im ‘oo stands take ‘eed lest ‘e fall.’”
“But then hark’ee Mr. ‘Empseed,” retorted Jellyband, still holding his sides with laughter, “the Scriptures didn’t know me. Why, I wouldn’t so much as drink a glass of ale with one o’ them murderin’ Frenchmen, and nothin’ ‘d make me change my opinions. Why! I’ve ‘eard it said that them frog-eaters can’t even speak the King’s English, so, of course, if any of ‘em tried to speak their God-forsaken lingo to me, why, I should spot them directly, see!—and forewarned is forearmed, as the saying goes.”
“Aye! my honest friend,” assented the stranger cheerfully, “I see that you are much too sharp, and a match for any twenty Frenchmen, and here’s to your very good health, my worthy host, if you’ll do me the honour to finish this bottle of mine with me.”
“I am sure you’re very polite, sir,” said Mr. Jellyband, wiping his eyes which were still streaming with the abundance of his laughter, “and I don’t mind if I do.”
The stranger poured out a couple of tankards full of wine, and having offered one to mine host, he took the other himself.
“Loyal Englishmen as we all are,” he said, whilst the same humorous smile played round the corners of his thin lips—“loyal as we are, we must admit that this at least is one good thing which comes to us from France.”
“Aye! we’ll none of us deny that, sir,” assented mine host.
“And here’s to the best landlord in England, our worthy host, Mr. Jellyband,” said the stranger in a loud tone of voice.
“Hi, hip, hurrah!” retorted the whole company present. Then there was a loud clapping of hands, and mugs and tankards made a rattling music upon the tables to the accompaniment of loud laughter at nothing in particular, and of Mr. Jellyband’s muttered exclamations:
“Just fancy ME bein’ talked over by any God-forsaken furriner!—What?—Lud love you, sir, but you do say some queer things.”
To which obvious fact the stranger heartily assented. It was certainly a preposterous suggestion that anyone could ever upset Mr. Jellyband’s firmly-rooted opinions anent the utter worthlessness of the inhabitants of the whole continent of Europe.
CHAPTER III THE REFUGEES
Feeling in every part of England certainly ran very high at this time against the French and their doings. Smugglers and legitimate traders between the French and the English coasts brought snatches of news from over the water, which made every honest Englishman’s blood boil, and made him long to have “a good go” at those murderers, who had imprisoned their king and all his family, subjected the queen and the royal children to every species of indignity, and were even now loudly demanding the blood of the whole Bourbon family and of every one of its adherents.
The execution of the Princesse de Lamballe, Marie Antoinette’s young and charming friend, had filled every one in England with unspeakable horror, the daily execution of scores of royalists of good family, whose only sin was their aristocratic name, seemed to cry for vengeance to the whole of civilised Europe.
Yet, with all that, no one dared to interfere. Burke had exhausted all his eloquence in trying to induce the British Government to fight the revolutionary government of France, but Mr. Pitt, with characteristic prudence, did not feel that this country was fit yet to embark on another arduous and costly war. It was for Austria to take the initiative; Austria, whose fairest daughter was even now a dethroned queen, imprisoned and insulted by a howling mob; surely ‘twas not—so argued Mr. Fox—for the whole of England to take up arms, because one set of Frenchmen chose to murder another.
As for Mr. Jellyband and his fellow John Bulls, though they looked upon all foreigners with withering contempt, they were royalist and anti-revolutionists to a man, and at this present moment were furious with Pitt for his caution and moderation, although they naturally understood nothing of the diplomatic reasons which guided that great man’s policy.
By now Sally came running back, very excited and very eager. The joyous company in the coffee-room had heard nothing of the noise outside, but she had spied a dripping horse and rider who had stopped at the door of “The Fisherman’s Rest,” and while the stable boy ran forward to take charge of the horse, pretty Miss Sally went to the front door to greet the welcome visitor. “I think I see’d my Lord Antony’s horse out in the yard, father,” she said, as she ran across the coffee-room.
But already the door had been thrown open from outside, and the next moment an arm, covered in drab cloth and dripping with the heavy rain, was round pretty Sally’s waist, while a hearty voice echoed along the polished rafters of the coffee-room.
“Aye, and bless your brown eyes for being so sharp, my pretty Sally,” said the man who had just entered, whilst worthy Mr. Jellyband came bustling forward, eager, alert and fussy, as became the advent of one of the most favoured guests of his hostel.
“Lud, I protest, Sally,” added Lord Antony, as he deposited a kiss on Miss Sally’s blooming cheeks, “but you are growing prettier and prettier every time I see you—and my honest friend, Jellyband here, have hard work to keep the fellows off that slim waist of yours. What say you, Mr. Waite?”
Mr. Waite—torn between his respect for my lord and his dislike of that particular type of joke—only replied with a doubtful grunt.
Lord Antony Dewhurst, one of the sons of the Duke of Exeter, was in those days a very perfect type of a young English gentlemen—tall, well set-up, broad of shoulders and merry of face, his laughter rang loudly wherever he went. A good sportsman, a lively companion, a courteous, well-bred man of the world, with not too much brains to spoil his temper, he was a universal favourite in London drawing-rooms or in the coffee-rooms of village inns. At “The Fisherman’s Rest” everyone knew him—for he was fond of a trip across to France, and always spent a night under worthy Mr. Jellyband’s roof on his way there or back.
He nodded to Waite, Pitkin and the others as he at last released Sally’s waist, and crossed over to the hearth to warm and dry himself: as he did so, he cast a quick, somewhat suspicious glance at the two strangers, who had quietly resumed their game of dominoes, and for a moment a look of deep earnestness, even of anxiety, clouded his jovial young face.
But only for a moment; the next he turned to Mr. Hempseed, who was respectfully touching his forelock.
“Well, Mr. Hempseed, and how is the fruit?”
“Badly, my lord, badly,” replied Mr. Hempseed, dolefully, “but what can you ‘xpect with this ‘ere government favourin’ them
