Chapter Fifty One.
In Carousal.
“We’ll drink - drink,
And our goblets clink,
Quaffing the blood-red wine;
The wenches we’ll toast,
And the Roundheads we’ll roast,
The Croppies, and all their kind.”
“A capital song! And right well you’ve sung it, Sir Thomas. Herrlich!”
“Your Highness compliments me.”
“Nein—nein. But who composed the ditty? It’s new to me.”
“Sir John Dertham. He who wrote the verses about Waller, and their defeat at Roundway Down—
“‘Great William the Con-
So fast did he run,
That he left half his name behind him.’
“Your Highness may remember them?”