"Faugh! you are as snappish as a cur whelp. I mean, what is he about?"
"Sleeping. Zooks! I'm sure he sleeps."
"Is he of good credit?"
"Faith, Roupall, I know not his banker."
"Good again, Master Robin; upon what grinding-stone were your wits sharpened?"
"Right loyally, good trooper; even upon King Log," replied Robin, grinning maliciously; and then, as if fearful that the gathering storm would forthwith burst, he continued: "Come, let's have a carouse, and wake the sleepers in that snug nest between walls; let's welcome in the morning, like gay gallants, while I tell you the court news, and exhibit the last court fashion, as it graces my own beautiful form!"
The man looked at him and smiled, soothed into something resembling good-nature by the odd humour and appearance of his old companion, who was tricked out, with much precision, in a blue doublet and yellow hose, while a large bow of sad-coloured riband, with fringed ends, dangled from either knee. He then glanced a look of complacency on his own proper person, and replied,—
"No, let them sleep, Robin; they are better off than I. That maidenlike friend of yours has taken possession of my bed, after your mother's routing me up as if I had been a stoat or a dormouse. Of course he is a Cavalier: I suppose he has a name; but is that, too, a secret?"
"Master Roupall," replied the other, with a look of great sagacity, "as to the person, it's hard to say who's who, these times; and as to the name, why, as you say, I suppose he has a name, and doubtless a good one, though I cannot exactly now call to mind what it is; for at court——"
"D—n court!" interrupted the other—"you're all court-smitten, I'm thinking. In plain English, I want to know who this youngster is? When Hugh is in one of his romances, he cares not who or what he sends us, either here, or, what is of more consequence, on the main-land—and we are to receive them and 'tend them, and all the time, mayhap, are hazarding our own heads; for I'd bet an even wager that one of the ferrymen is a spy in the pay of old red-nose; and it's little we get for such hazards—it's many a day since even a keg of brandy has been run ashore."