nd places
too! yet the cellar holds good.

_Oliver._ Many and great thanks! But there are certain men on the
other side of the gate, who might take it ill if I turn away and
neglect them.

_Sir Oliver._ Let them enter also, or eat their victuals where they
are.

_Oliver._ They have proud stomachs: they are recusants.

_Sir Oliver._ Recusants of what? of beef and ale? We have claret, I
trust, for the squeamish, if they are above the condition of
tradespeople. But of course you leave no person of higher quality in
the outer court.

_Oliver._ Vain are they and worldly, although such wickedness is the
most abominable in their cases. Idle folks are fond of sitting in the
sun: I would not forbid them this indulgence.

_Sir Oliver._ But who are they?

_Oliver._ The Lord knows. Maybe priests, deacons, and such-like.

_Sir Oliver._ Then, sir, they are gentlemen. And the commission you
bear from the parliamentary thieves, to sack and pillage my
mansion-house, is far less vexatious and insulting to me, than your
behaviour in keeping them so long at my stable-door. With your
permission, or without it, I shall take the liberty to invite them to
partake of my poor hospitality.

_Oliver._ But, Uncle Sir Oliver! there are rules and ordinances
whereby it must be manifested that they lie under displeasure ... not
mine ... not mine ... but my milk must not flow for them.

_Sir Oliver._ You may enter the house or remain where you are, at your
option; I make my visit to these gentlemen immediately, for I am tired
of standing. If thou ever reachest my age,[12] Oliver! (but God will
not surely let this be) thou wilt know that the legs become at last of
doubtful fidelity in the service of the body.

_Oliver._ Uncle Sir Oliver! now that, as it seemeth, you have been
taking a survey of the courtyard and its contents, am I indiscreet in
asking your worship whether I acted not prudently in keeping the
_men-at-belly_ under the custody of the _men-at-arms_? This
pestilence, like unto one I remember to have read about in some poetry
of Master Chapman's,[13] began with the dogs and mules, and afterwards
crope up into the breasts of men.

_Sir Oliver._ I call such treatment barbarous; their troopers will not
let the gentlemen come with me into the house, but insist on sitting
down to dinner with them. And yet, having brought them out of their
colleges, these brutal half-soldiers must know that they are fellows.

_Oliver._ Yea, of a tr