Hereupon rose an answering chorus.
"Throw 'im out! Duck 'im! Gi'e 'un one for 'isself!"
Reaching the tavern, I halted on the threshold of a low, wide chamber, floored with red tiles and furnished with oaken tables and benches, where I beheld some half-dozen angry country-fellows grouped about a solitary individual who fronted them in very desperate and determined manner, his back to the wall; an extremely down-at-heels gentleman this, who yet cocked his hat and glared about him with an air of polite ferocity.
"In half a pig's whisper," said he, squaring his arms belligerently, "in half a pig's whisper or less, blood will flow, gore will gush and spatter—" Here, chancing to catch sight of me in the doorway, he flourished off his hat, a miserably sorry-looking object, and bowed profoundly. "Aha, Sir Oswald," quoth he, "you arrive most aptly—in the very nick, the moment, the absolute tick! If you have a mind to see a little delicate fibbing, some scientific bruising as taught by the famous Natty Bell, foot and fist-work as exhibited by Glorious John, Jem Belcher and—"
"'E swallowed all my beer, 'e did, sir!" exclaimed a red-faced man in gaiters and smock-frock, "in one gullup—so quick no 'and could stay the deed! Stole me beer an' can't deny it—"
"No, by heaven!" exclaimed the down-at-heels gentleman. "I drank the fellow's beer, every drop—could have drunk more. Our fat and furious friend labours under a delusion, for to drink good beer with a man out of that man's own pot is surely a mark of high esteem—"
"Dang your 'steem!" cried the stout fellow, flourishing his empty tankard threateningly. "A chap as thieves a chap's beer is a chap as can't be no chap's friend! 'Ow about it, you chaps?" quoth he, appealing to his fellows. "Shall us let a chap thieve a chap's beer an' not kick that chap out where that chap belongs—'ow about it?" Whereupon came the answering chorus:
"Aye, Sim, go for 'im, lad—we'm wi' 'ee! Pitch 'im out! Duck 'im in th' 'orsepond!"
At this juncture spake one I deemed to be the landlord, a gloomy being who drooped above a small bar in one corner.
"Do as ye will, neighbours all, do as ye will—only don't break nothink—them as breaks, pays!"