ong crowd to Moorgate--man and maid, noble
and 'prentice, alderman and oyster-woman, jesting and scolding as we
jostled one another in the narrow way, and rejoicing when at length we
broke free into the pleasant meadows and smelt the sweetness of the
early hay.

Already I spied sport, for there before us swaggered the mercers'
'prentices of London Bridge, ready to settle scores for the affront they
had received at the New Exchange.

"Ho! ho!" quoth I, with vast content, "'tis time we had dinner, my lads,
if it comes to that."

So we besieged the booths, and fortified ourselves with beef and ale,
and felt ready for anything that might happen.

'Twas no battle after all; for, as ill-luck would have it, just as we
faced them and bade them come on, the alderman of the Bridge Ward rode
up.

"What! a shame on you to mar a day like this with your boyish wrangles!
Is there no wrestling-ring, or shooting-butts, or leaping-fence where
you can vent your rivalry, without flying at one another's throats like
curs? Call you that loyalty? Have we no enemies better worth our
mettle than fellow-Englishmen?"

This speech abashed us a little, and the captain of the Bridge
'prentices said, sulkily:

"I care not to break their heads, worship; there's little to be got out
of that. Come, lads, we can find better sport in the juggler's booth."

"His worship came in a good hour for you," cried we. "Thank him you can
slink away on your own legs this time, and need no one to drag you feet
foremost off the Fields."

"Come, come," said the good alderman, "away with such foolish talk.
Let's see a match struck up. I myself will give a new long-bow and a
sheaf of arrows to the best jumper of you all. What say you? The
highest leap and the broadest? Ho, there!" added he, calling a servant
to him; "bid them clear a space for a match 'twixt the gallant
'prentices of the Bridge and the gallant 'prentices without Temple Bar.
Come, boys; were I forty years younger I'd put you to it to distance me.
But my jumping days are gone by, and I am but a judge."

Then we gave him a cheer, the bluff old boy; and, forgetting all our
quarrel in the thought of the long-bow and arrows, we trooped at his
horse's tail to the open space, and doffed our coats in readiness for
the contest.

A great crowd stood round to see us jump. The scene remains in my
mind's eye even now. 'Prentices, bare-headed, squatted cross-legged on
the grass, bandying their n