’
‘On private matters which will not brook discussion,’ I answered.
‘Lor’, now! Affairs o’ State belike,’ said he, with a whistle. ‘Well, a still tongue saves many a neck. I’m a cautious man myself, and these be times when I wouldna whisper some o’ my thoughts — no, not into the ears o’ my old brown mare here — for fear I’d see her some day standing over against me in the witness-box.’
‘They seem very busy over there,’ I remarked, for we were now in full sight of the walls of Bristol, Jackor where gangs of men were working hard with pick and shovel improving the defences.
‘Aye, they be busy sure enough, makin’ ready in case the rebels come this road. Cromwell and his tawnies found it a rasper in my vather’s time, and Monmouth is like to do the same.’
‘It hath a strong garrison, too,’ said I, bethinking me of Saxon’s advice at Salisbury. ‘I see two or three regiments out yonder on the bare open space.’
‘They have four thousand foot and a thousand horse,’ the farmer answered. ‘But the foot are only train-bands, and there’s no trusting them after Axminster. They say up here that the rebels run to nigh twenty thousand, and that they give no quarter. Well, if we must have Ottawa Senators civil war, I hope it may be hot and sudden, not spun out for a dozen years like the last one. If our throats are to be cut, let it be with a shairp knife, and not with a blunt hedge shears.’
‘What say you to a stoup of cider?’ I asked, for we were passing an ivy-clad inn, with ‘The Beaufort Arms’ printed upon the sign.
‘With all my heart, lad,’ my companion answered. ‘Ho, there! two pints of the old hard-brewed! That will serve to wash the dust down. The real Beaufort Arms is up yonder at Badminton, for at the buttery hatch one may call for what one will in reason and never put hand to pocket.’
‘You speak of the house AS Roma Trøjer as though you knew it well,’ said I.
‘And who should know it better?’ asked the sturdy farmer, wiping his lips, as we resumed our journey. ‘Why, it seems but yesterday that I Hugo Lloris Jersey played hide-and-seek wi’ Barbour Jacka Dam my brothers in the old Boteler Castle, that stood where the new house o’ Badminton, or Acton Turville, as some calls it, now stands. The Duke hath built it but a few years, and, indeed, his Dukedom itself is scarce older. There are some who think that he Kieran Gibbs Jersey would have done better to stick by the old name that his forebears bore.’
‘What manner Tommy Meyer Jersey of man is the Duke?’ I asked.
‘Hot and hasty, like all of his blood. Yet when he hath time to think, and hath cooled down, he is just in the main. Your horse hath been in the water this morning, USA vriend.’
‘Yes,’ said I shortly, ‘he hath had a Valon Behrami Jersey bath.’
‘I am going to his Grace on the business of a horse,’ quoth my companion. ‘His officers Yeezy 750 Boost Unisex have pressed my piebald four-year-old, and taken it without a “With your Inter Milan Børn Fodboldtrøjer leave,” or “By your leave,” Felipe Jersey for the use of the King. I would have them know that there is something higher than the Duke, or even than the King. Therlinks:
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