"A most mercer-like memory!" said Lambourne. "The gentleman asks him of
the lady's beauty, and he talks of her fine clothes!"

"I tell thee," said the mercer, somewhat disconcerted, "I had little
time to look at her; for just as I was about to give her the good time
of day, and for that purpose had puckered my features with a smile--"

"Like those of a jackanape simpering at a chestnut," said Michael
Lambourne.

"Up started of a sudden," continued Goldthred, without heeding the
interruption, "Tony Foster himself, with a cudgel in his hand--"

"And broke thy head across, I hope, for thine impertinence," said his
entertainer.

"That were more easily said than done," answered Goldthred indignantly;
"no, no--there was no breaking of heads. It's true, he advanced his
cudgel, and spoke of laying on, and asked why I did not keep the
public road, and such like; and I would have knocked him over the pate
handsomely for his pains, only for the lady's presence, who might have
swooned, for what I know."

"Now, out upon thee for a faint-spirited slave!" said Lambourne; "what
adventurous knight ever thought of the lady's terror, when he went
to thwack giant, dragon, or magician, in her presence, and for her
deliverance? But why talk to thee of dragons, who would be driven back
by a dragon-fly. There thou hast missed the rarest opportunity!"