Hal came out of Mr. Millar’s, the confectioner’s shop, with a hatful of cakes in his hand. Mr. Millar’s dog was sitting on the flags before the door, and he looked up with a wistful, begging eye at Hal, who was eating a queen cake. Hal, who was wasteful even in his good-nature, threw a whole queen cake to the dog, who swallowed it for a single mouthful.
“There goes twopence in the form of a queen cake,” said Mr. Gresham.
Hal next offered some of his cakes to his uncle and cousin; but they thanked him, and refused to eat any, because, they said, they were not hungry; so he ate and ate as he walked along, till at last he stopped, and said, “This bun tastes so bad after the queen cakes, I can’t bear it!” and he was going to fling it from him into the river.
“Oh, it is a pity to waste that good bun; we may be glad of it yet,” said Ben; “give it me rather than throw it away.”
“Why, I thought you said you were not hungry,” said Hal.
“True, I am not hungry now; but that is no reason why I should never be hungry again.”
“Well, there is the cake for you. Take it; for it has made me sick, and I don’t care what becomes of it.”
Ben folded the refuse bit of his cousin’s bun in a piece of paper, and put it into his pocket.
“I’m beginning to be exceeding tired or sick or something,” said Hal; “and as there is a stand of coaches somewhere hereabouts, had not we better take a coach, instead of walking all the way to Bristol?”
“For a stout archer,” said Mr. Gresham, “you are more easily tired than one might have expected. However, with all my heart, let us take a coach, for Ben asked me to show him the cathedral yesterday; and I believe I should find it rather too much for me to walk so far, though I am not sick with eating good things.”