“Coward, coward, poltroon!” was the cry. “I see by his face he has failed. Never mind them, Roland. Your chair at the head of the table always awaits you. There is a piece of black bread left, and though the wine is thin, it quenches thirst.”
Roland flung off his cloak, hung it and the sword on a peg, and took his seat at the head of the table. Pushing away the flagons that stood near him, he drew the leathern bag from his belt, and poured the shining yellow coins on the table, at the sight of which there arose such a yell that the stout beams above them seemed to quake.
“Apologize!” demanded Roland, when the clamor quieted down. “The man who refuses to apologize, and that abjectly, must take down his sword from the peg and settle with me!”
A shout of apology was the response.
“We grovel at your feet, High Mightiness!” cried the man who had called him poltroon.
“I have taken the liberty of ordering a fish and meat supper, with a double quantity of Rudesheimer wine. Again I offer to fight any man who resents this encroachment on my part.”
“I could spit you with a hand tied behind my back,” cried one, “but I am of a forgiving nature, and will wait instead for the spitted fowl.”
“Most of this money,” continued Roland quietly, “goes, I suspect, to the landlord, as a slight recognition of past kindness, but I am promised a further supply this evening, which will be divided equally among ourselves. I ask you, therefore, to be sparing of the wine.” Here he was compelled to pause for some moments, and listen to groans, hoots, howls, and the rapping of empty flagons on the stout table.
The commotion was interrupted by the entrance of the landlord, who brought with him the promised Rhine wine; for, hearing the noise, he supposed it represented impatience of the company at the delay, a mistake which no one thought it worth while to rectify. He promised that the fish would follow in a very few minutes, and went out to see that his word was kept.
“Why should we be sparing of the wine?” asked a capable drinker, who had drained his flagon before asking the question. “With all that money on the table it seems to me a scandalous proviso.”