, and Oliver was (or had schooled himself to be) a temperate man,
the citizens had not quite forgotten their love of good cheer; and the
Protector himself was not averse from the keeping up some state and
splendour, Whitehall being now well-nigh as splendid as in the late
King's time, and his Highness sitting with his Make-Believe Lords around
him (Lisle, Whitelocke, and the rest), and eating his meat to tuckets
upon Trumpets, and being otherwise puffed up with Vanity.

The good folks with whom Arabella was sojourning thought it might help
to cure her of her sad moping ways if she saw the grand pageant go by,
and mingled in the merriment and feasting which the ladies of Sir
Fortunatus's family--the Knight himself being bidden to the
Guildhall--proposed to give their neighbours on the day when Oliver came
into the City. To this intent, the windows of their house without
Ludgate were all taken out of their frames, and the casements themselves
hung with rich cloths and tapestries, and decked with banners. And an
open house was kept, literally; meats and wines and sweets being set out
in every room, even to the bed-chambers, and all of the Turkey
merchant's acquaintance being bidden to come in and help themselves, and
take a squeeze at the windows to see his Highness go by. Only one window
on the first floor was set apart, and here sat the Ladies of the family,
with Mistress Deborah Clay, the Remembrancer's lady, and one that was
sister to a Judge of Commonwealth's Bench, and Arabella Greenville, who
was, for a wonder, quite cheerful and sprightly that morning, and who
had for her neighbour one Lady Lisle, the wife of John Lisle, one of
Cromwell's Chief Councillors and Commissioners of the Great Seal.[B]

The time that passed between their taking seats and the coming of the
pageant was passed pleasantly enough; not in drinking of healths, which
practice was then considered as closely akin to an unlawful thing, but
in laughing and quaffing, and whispering of merry jests. For I have
usually found that, be the Rule of Church and State ever so sour and
stern, folks _will_ laugh and quaff and jest on the sly, and be merry in
the green tree, if they are forced to be sad in the dry.

There was a gentleman standing behind Arabella, a Counsellor of
Lincoln's Inn I think, who was telling a droll story of Lord President
Bradshaw to his friend from the Temple. Not greatly a person of whom to
relate merry tales, I should think, that te