y ask her."

"And what does Mistress Hortense say?"

"I think," answers Rebecca meditatively, "from the quantity of love-verse
writ, she must keep saying--No."

Then Lady Kirke turns to bid us all go to the Duke's Theatre, where the
king's suite would appear that night. Rebecca, of course, would not go.
Her father would be expecting her when he came home, she said. So Pierre
Radisson and I escorted Lady Kirke and her daughter to the play, riding
in one of those ponderous coaches, with four belaced footmen clinging
behind and postillions before. At the entrance to the playhouse was a
great concourse of crowding people, masked ladies, courtiers with pages
carrying torches for the return after dark, merchants with linkmen, work
folk with lanterns, noblemen elbowing tradesmen from the wall, tradesmen
elbowing mechanics; all pushing and jostling and cracking their jokes
with a freedom of speech that would have cost dear in Boston Town. The
beaux, I mind, had ready-writ love-verses sticking out of pockets thick
as bailiffs' yellow papers; so that a gallant could have stocked his own
munitions by picking up the missives dropped at the feet of disdainfuls.
Of the play, I recall nothing but that some favourite of the king, Mary
Davies, or the famous Nell, or some such an one, danced a monstrous bold
jig. Indeed, our grand people, taking their cue from the courtiers'
boxes, affected a mighty contempt for the play, except when a naughty
jade on the boards stepped high, or blew a kiss to some dandy among the
noted folk. For aught I could make out, they did not come to hear, but
to be heard; the ladies chattering and ogling; the gallants stalking from
box to box and pit to gallery, waving their scented handkerchiefs,
striking a pose where the greater part of the audience could see the
flash of beringed fingers, or taking a pinch of snuff with a snap of the
lid to call attention to its gold-work and naked goddesses.

"Drat these tradespeople, kinsman!" says Lady Kirke, as a fat townsman
and his wife pushed past us, "drat these tradespeople!" says she as we
were taking our place in one of the boxes, "'tis monstrous gracious of
the king to come among them at all!"

Methought her memory of Sir John's career had been suddenly clipped
short; but Pierre Radisson only smiled solemnly. Some jokes, like
dessert, are best taken cold, not hot.

Then there was a craning of necks; and the king's party came in, His
Majesty grown sallo