“Who are you?” roared Britton.
“I—I—oh—I—I—am—a cordwainer from the Borough, sir.”
“How dare you call me, ‘Sir?’”
“Why—a—a—really—”
Some one here charitably whispered to the cordwainer the fact of Britton’s kingly dignity! And with many winks and nods he corrected himself, and said,—
“I humbly beg your majesty’s most gracious pardon.”
“You be d—d!” said Britton. “You are a cordwainer, are you?—A cobbler, you mean—a patcher of leaks in bad shoes. Hark ye, Mr. Cordwainer, the next time you presume to laugh at anything I say, I’ll make a leak in your head.”
“May it please you, King Britton,” interposed the landlord, “I am here!”
“No you ain’t,” cried Britton, tripping up the landlord, who forthwith fell flat on the floor, “you are there!”
This was a stock joke, and was perpetrated nearly every evening; so the company laughed accordingly, particularly those who had seen and heard it before, the new-comers not being fully up to the wit of it.