CHAPTER III.
It ne’er shall stop for me, this merry wager:
That which I say when gamesome, I’ll avouch
In my most sober mood, ne’er trust me else.
The Hazard Table.
“And how doth your kinsman, good mine host?” said Tressilian, when Giles Gosling first appeared in the public room, on the morning following the revel which we described in the last chapter. “Is he well, and will he abide by his wager?”
“For well, sir, he started two hours since, and has visited I know not what purlieus of his old companions; hath but now returned, and is at this instant breakfasting on new-laid eggs and muscadine; and for his wager, I caution you as a friend to have little to do with that, or indeed with aught that Mike proposes. Wherefore, I counsel you to a warm breakfast upon a culiss, which shall restore the tone of the stomach; and let my nephew and Master Goldthred swagger about their wager as they list.”
“It seems to me, mine host,” said Tressilian, “that you know not well what to say about this kinsman of yours; and that you can neither blame nor commend him without some twinge of conscience.”
“You have spoken truly, Master Tresilian,”
