"Captain Ravenshaw, by your leave," he said, instantly, in a loud tone, with an ironical show of a petitioner's deference.
"Forsooth, yes; a captain of the suburbs," replied the young gentleman, with a more pronounced sneer.
Now at this time—toward the end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth—and for a long time after, certain of the suburbs of London were inhabited numerously by people of ill repute. There were, especially, women whom the law sometimes took in hand and sent to the Bridewell to break chalk, or treated to a public ride in a cart, as targets for rotten vegetables, addled eggs, and such projectiles. Many an unemployed soldier, or bully who called himself soldier, would bestow, or impose, his protection upon some one of these frail creatures in the time of her prosperity, exacting from her the means of livelihood. Hence did Ravenshaw see in the title of "captain of the suburbs" an insult little less than lay in that of "Apple-John," or "Apple-squire," itself.
When a gentleman calls another by the name of a bad thing, it is not necessarily implied that he thinks the other is that thing; but it is certain that he means to be defiantly offensive. Therefore, in this case, the captain's part was not to deny, but to resent. Not only must he keep up his reputation with the other gentlemen as a man not to be affronted, but he really was in a towering rage at being bearded with easy temerity by such a youngling.
"What!" quoth he. "Thou sprig! Thy wits are strayed away, methinks. Or has thy nurse been teaching thee to use a pert tongue?"
"Nay, save your own tongue for the tasting of yon capon. I speak only truth. Your reputation is well known."
"Why, thou saucy boy, I may not spit butterflies on my sword, nor provoke striplings by giving them the lie; else—"
The captain finished with a shrug of vexation.
"Look ye, gentlemen, he lays it to my youth," continued the persecutor, "but there's yet a horse of another colour. This captain is free enough with his bluster and his sword; he has drawn quarts of blood for a single word that misliked him, upon occasion; but he will bear a thousand scurvy affronts from any man for the sake of a supper. You shall see—"