"Take it thyself, then, bully Mike," answered Goldthred. "Yonder is the

enchanted manor, and the dragon, and the lady, all at thy service, if

thou darest venture on them."

"Why, so I would for a quartern of sack," said the soldier--"or stay: I

am foully out of linen--wilt thou bet a piece of Hollands against these

five angels, that I go not up to the Hall to-morrow and force Tony

Foster to introduce me to his fair guest?"

"I accept your wager," said the mercer; "and I think, though thou hadst

even the impudence of the devil, I shall gain on thee this bout. Our

landlord here shall hold stakes, and I will stake down gold till I send

the linen."

"I will hold stakes on no such matter," said Gosling. "Good now, my

kinsman, drink your wine in quiet, and let such ventures alone. I

promise you, Master Foster hath interest enough to lay you up in

lavender in the Castle at Oxford, or to get your legs made acquainted

with the town-stocks."

"That would be but renewing an old intimacy, for Mike's shins and the

town's wooden pinfold have been well known to each other ere now," said

the mercer; "but he shall not budge from his wager, unless he means to

pay forfeit."

"Forfeit?" said Lambourne; "I scorn it. I value Tony Foster's wrath no

more than a shelled pea-cod; and I will visit his Lindabrides, by Saint

George, be he willing or no!"

"I would gladly pay your halves of the risk, sir," said Tressilian, "to

be permitted to accompany you on the adventure."

"In what would that advantage you, sir?" answered Lambourne.

"In nothing, sir," said Tressilian, "unless to mark the skill and valour

with which you conduct yourself. I am a traveller who seeks for strange

rencounters and uncommon passages, as the knights of yore did after

adventures and feats of arms."

"Nay, if it pleasures you to see a trout tickled," answered Lambourne,

"I care not how many witness my skill. And so here I drink success to my

enterprise; and he that will not pledge me on his knees is a rascal, and

I will cut his legs off by the garters!"

The draught which Michael Lambourne took upon this occasion had been

preceded by so many others, that reason tottered on her throne. He

swore one or two incoherent oaths at the mercer, who refused, reasonably

enough, to pledge him to a sentiment which inferred the loss of his own

wager.




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