Gerard, having penetrated the outer fort, soon found his way to the stove (as the public room was called from the principal article in it), and sat down near the oven, in which were only a few live embers that diffused a mild and grateful heat.
After waiting patiently a long time, he asked a grim old fellow with a long white beard, who stalked solemnly in, and turned the hour-glass, and then was stalking out, when supper would be. The grisly Ganymede counted the guests on his fingers—“When I see thrice as many here as now.” Gerard groaned.
The grisly tyrant resented the rebellious sound. “Inns are not built for one,” said he; “if you can't wait for the rest, look out for another lodging.”
Gerard sighed.
At this the greybeard frowned.
After a while company trickled steadily in, till full eighty persons of various conditions were congregated, and to our novice the place became a chamber of horrors; for here the mothers got together and compared ringworms, and the men scraped the mud off their shoes with their knives, and left it on the floor, and combed their long hair out, inmates included, and made their toilet, consisting generally of a dry rub. Water, however, was brought in ewers. Gerard pounced on one of these, but at sight of the liquid contents lost his temper and said to the waiter, “Wash you first your water, and then a man may wash his hands withal.”
“An' it likes you not, seek another inn!”
Gerard said nothing, but went quietly and courteously besought an old traveller to tell him how far it was to the next inn.
“About four leagues.”
Then Gerard appreciated the grim pleasantry of the unbending sire.