“Gramercy! true enough! nay, afore God, too true by half! I never saw the like! Who would believe it? I wish I were fairly rid of this examination,—my hands washed clean thereof! Another time,—anon! We have our quarterly sessions; we are many together. At present I remand—”
And now, indeed, unless Sir Silas had taken his worship by the sleeve, he would may-hap have remanded the lad. But Sir Silas, still holding the sleeve and shaking it, said, hurriedly,—
“Let me entreat your worship to ponder. What black does the fellow talk of? My blood and bile rose up against the rogue; but surely I did not turn black in the face, or in the mouth, as the fellow calls it?”
Whether Master Silas had some suspicion and inkling of the cause or not, he rubbed his right hand along his face and lips, and, looking upon it, cried aloud,—
“Ho, ho! is it off? There is some upon my finger’s end, I find. Now I have it,—ay, there it is. That large splash upon the centre of the table is tallow, by my salvation! The profligates sat up until the candle burned out, and the last of it ran through the socket upon the board. We knew it before. I did convey into my mouth both fat and smut!”
“Many of your cloth and kidney do that, good Master Silas, and make no wry faces about it,” quoth the youngster, with indiscreet merriment, although short of laughter, as became him who had already stepped too far and reached the mire.
To save paper and time, I shall now, for the most part, write only what they all said, not saying that they said it, and just copying out in my clearest hand what fell respectively from their mouths.
Sir Silas.
“I did indeed spit it forth, and emunge my lips, as who should not?”
William Shakspeare.