The large gallant roared at this, and said, "Faith, ladies, you brought that on yourselves!" But one of the other two gamesters, a lean, fox-faced, eager-looking little man, he whose pile of winnings lay before the indolent blonde, frowned with resentment on her behalf. First his frown was directed at Ravenshaw; but, deeming it prudent to aim it elsewhere, he turned it upon the large gentleman, saying:
"Your mirth is easily stirred, Master Burney."
The brunette shot a look of anger at the speaker for the offensive tone he used toward her gallant. The blonde noticed this, and took the little gentleman's hand in hers, to show where her allegiance lay; and then she drawled out, with a motion which might have come to a shrug of horror had she not been too lazy to finish it:
"Oh, God! I pity Delilah, the poor woman, if her Samson was such a bottle-ale rogue as this beast!"
Master Burney laughed at this sally, and somewhat reinstated himself in the favour of the little gallant.
Ravenshaw bowed low. "I salute your most keen, subtle, elegant, biting wit, Lady Greensleeves! It cuts; oh, it cuts!"
"'Lady Greensleeves!' Ho, ho, ho!" bawled Master Burney, and forthwith essayed to sing, with a tunelessness the worse for the opposition of the fiddlers, some lines of the familiar ballad:
"Greensleeves was all my joy,
Greensleeves was my delight;