would say, on being invited thither: "Well! I will go, but under protest we shall not be given to drink in the cup;" yet when once they were there, would they drink therein as well as ever. At the last would they aye think better of it, and make no more scruple whatever about drinking. Nay! some did even better, and turned the said images to good use in fitting time and place; and yet more than this, some did act dissolutely of set purpose to make trial of the same, for that every person of spirit would fain essay everything. So here we have the fatal effects of this cup so well dight. And hereanent must each fancy for himself all the other discourse, and thoughts and looks and words, that these ladies did indulge in and give vent to, one with another, whether in privity or in open company.
I ween this cup was of a very different sort from the one whereof M. Ronsard[1] doth speak in one of his earliest Odes, dedicated to the late King Henri, which doth thus begin:
Comme un qui prend une couppe,
Seul honneur de son tresor.
Et de rang verse a la trouppe
Du vin qui rit dedans l'or.
(As one who takes a cup, sole honour of all his treasure, and duly pours therein to the company good wine that laughs within the gold.)
However in this cup I tell of the wine laughed not at any, but rather the folk at the wine. For verily some dames did drink laughing, and others trembling with delight; and yet others would be nigh compissoyent,—I mean not of course just ordinary piddling, but something
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