"A sheep sir, a sheep?" spluttered Sir Benjamin. "Malediction! What d'ye mean?"
"I mean I object t' Betty being turned int' a sheep either by inference, insinuation or induction—I 'ppeal t' the company!"
Here ensued a heated discussion ending in his lordship's objection being quashed, whereupon Sir Benjamin, his face redder than ever and his elegant peruke a little awry, continued:
"Ye feathered songsters blithely sing
Ye snowy lambkins frisk and spring
To Betty let our glasses ring
In joyous Westerham!"
Sir Benjamin sat down amidst loud acclaim, and there immediately followed a perfervid debate as to the rival merits of the several authors and finally, amid a scene of great excitement, Mr. Marchdale was declared the victor.
And now appeared a mighty bowl of punch flanked by pipes and tobacco at sight of which the company rose in welcome.
"Gentlemen," said Sir Benjamin, grasping silver ladle much as it had been a sceptre, "the Muses have departed but in their stead behold the jovial Bacchus with the attendant sprite yclept Virginia. Gentlemen, it hath been suggested that we shall drink glass and glass and——"
"Damned be he who first cries 'hold enough'!" murmured Alvaston.
"Gentlemen, the night is young, let now the rosy hours pass in joyous revelry and good-fellowship!"
So the merry riot waxed and waned, tobacco smoke ascended in filmy wreaths, songs were sung and stories told while ever the glasses filled and grew empty and the Major, lighting his fifth pipe at a candle, turned to find Lord Cleeve addressing him low-voiced amid the general din across a barricade of empty bottles.