Bullcalf was pricked. The justices and their military friend withdrew to luncheon.
“Good Master Corporate Bardolph,” said Bullcalf when the troops were left alone with that warlike personage, “stand my friend, and here is four Harry ten shillings in French crowns for you.”
Bullcalf urged his plea by further arguments. They were unnecessary. The first was more than sufficient.
“Go to: stand aside,” said Bardolph, pocketing the money.
Mouldy quitted the ranks and motioned his superior to grant him also a private conference.
“And good Master Corporal Captain, for my old dame’s sake, stand my friend: she has nobody to do anything about her, when I am gone: and she is old and cannot help herself. You shall have forty, Sir.”
Chink! Chink!
“Go to: stand aside.”
“Sir, a word with you,” said Bardolph when his Captain reappeared with the two justices. “I have three pound to free Mouldy and Bullcalf.”
It should be observed that four ten shilling pieces added to forty shillings at that period, as now, made a total of four pounds sterling. Bardolph’s education had been neglected—and let us hope that his miscalculation was merely the result of a total ignorance of the rules of compound addition.