“But the lad saith thou hast stealed him awa-ay from ’s ho-ome,” rumbled the smith, like a doubtful earthquake; “and we’ll ha’ no stealing o’ lads awa-ay from ho-ome in County Herts!”
“Nay, that we won’t!” cried one. “Hurrah, John Smith—fair play, fair play!” and there came an ugly, threatening murmur from the crowd.
“What! Fair play?” cried Master Carew, turning so sharply about, with his hand upon his poniard, that each made as if it were not he but his neighbor had growled. “Why, sirs, what if I took any one of ye out of your poverty and common clothes down into London town, horseback like a king, and had ye sing before the Queen, and play for earls, and talk with the highest dames in all the land; and fed ye well, and spoke ye fair, and lodged ye soft, and clad ye fine, and wrought the whole town on to cheer ye, and to fill your purses full of gold? What, sir,” said he, turning to the gaping farrier—“what if I promised thee to turn thine every word to a silver sixpence, and thy smutty grins to golden angels—what wouldst thou? Knock me in the head with thy dirty sledge, and bawl foul play?”
“Nay, that I’d not,” roared the burly smith, with a stupid, ox-like grin, scratching his tousled head; “I’d say, ‘Go it, bully, and a plague on him that said thee nay!’”
“And yet when I would fill this silly fellow’s jerkin full of good gold Harry shovel-boards for the simple drawing of his breath, ye bawl ‘Foul play!’”
“What, here! come out, lad,” roared the smith, with a great horse-laugh, swinging Nick forward and thwacking him jovially between the shoulders with his brawny hand; “come out, and go along o’ the master here,—’tis for thy good,—and ho-ome wull keep, I trow, till thou dost come again.”
But Nick hung back, and clung to the blacksmith’s grimy arm, crying in despair: “I will na—oh, I will na!”
“Tut, tut!” cried Master Carew. “Come, Nicholas; I mean thee well, I’ll speak thee fair, and I’ll treat thee true”—and he smiled so frankly that even Nick’s doubts almost wavered. “Come, I’ll swear it on my hilt,” said he.
The smith’s brow clouded. “Nay,” said he; “we’ll no swearing by hilts or by holies here; the bailiff will na have it, sir.”
“Good! then upon mine honour as an Englishman!” cried Carew. “What, how, bullies? Upon mine honour as an Englishman!—how is it? Here we be, all Englishmen together!” and he clapped his hand to Will Hostler’s shoulder, whereat Will stood up very straight and looked around, as if all at once he were somebody instead of somewhat less than nobody at all of any consequence. “What!—ye are all for fair play?—and I am for fair play, and good Master Smith, with his beautiful shoe, here, is for fair play! Why, sirs, my bullies, we are all for fair play; and what more can a man ask than good, downright English fair play? Nothing, say I. Fair play first, last, and all the time!” and he waved his hand. “Hurrah for downright English fair play!”