Mr. Pepperill stood up and stirred the steaming sea before him, in which floated yellow islets of lemon. All eyes were on the bowl, all nostrils were dilated and sniffing, all mouths watering.
Pasco filled each glass, and then ensued a nodding all round; eyes were turned up, lips smacked, and the precious liquor allowed to trickle down the throats in thin rills over the tongue.
Presently the clarionet put down his glass and said, “It was a lucky job, Pasco, that your rick o’ straw escaped t’other night.”
“Ay, ’twas a first-rate chance,” said the landlord, who had come and remained to taste his own brew and hear encomiums on it.
“You see the wind was t’other way,” said the ’cello.
“And ’twasn’t insured,” added the clarionet.
All the rest looked round, and frowned, and reared their chins. The clarionet shrank together. What had he said? Something stupid or uncivil? He was too dull to see where his error lay.
“That had nothing to do with it. ’Twas water chucked over it as saved it,” threw in the bassoon, flying to the rescue.
“My straw rick suffered more from well-intentioned assistants than from anything else,” said Pepperill. “The wind was direct away from it, and so it couldn’t hurt.”
“It was coorious, though, the fire taking place when everyone was away from home,” said the clarionet.