butler, bringing his left hand from behind the small of his back,
produced the bottle with the corkscrew already inserted; uncorked it at
a jerk; and placed the magnum and the cork before his master with the
dignity of conscious cleverness.

'Ha!' said brother Ned, first examining the cork and afterwards filling
his glass, while the old butler looked complacently and amiably on, as
if it were all his own property, but the company were quite welcome to
make free with it, 'this looks well, David.'

'It ought to, sir,' replied David. 'You'd be troubled to find such a
glass of wine as is our double-diamond, and that Mr Linkinwater knows
very well. That was laid down when Mr Linkinwater first come: that wine
was, gentlemen.'

'Nay, David, nay,' interposed brother Charles.

'I wrote the entry in the cellar-book myself, sir, if you please,' said
David, in the tone of a man, quite confident in the strength of his
facts. 'Mr Linkinwater had only been here twenty year, sir, when that
pipe of double-diamond was laid down.'

'David is quite right, quite right, brother Charles,' said Ned: 'are the
people here, David?'

'Outside the door, sir,' replied the butler.

'Show 'em in, David, show 'em in.'

At this bidding, the older butler placed before his master a small tray
of clean glasses, and opening the door admitted the jolly porters and
warehousemen whom Nicholas had seen below. They were four in all, and as
they came in, bowing, and grinning, and blushing, the housekeeper, and
cook, and housemaid, brought up the rear.

'Seven,' said brother Ned, filling a corresponding number of glasses
with the double-diamond, 'and David, eight. There! Now, you're all of
you to drink the health of your best friend Mr Timothy Linkinwater, and
wish him health and long life and many happy returns of this day, both
for his own sake and that of your old masters, who consider him an
inestimable treasure. Tim Linkinwater, sir, your health. Devil take you,
Tim Linkinwater, sir, God bless you.'

With this singular contradiction of terms, brother Ned gave Tim
Linkinwater a slap on the back, which made him look, for the moment,
almost as apoplectic as the butler: and tossed off the contents of his
glass in a twinkling.

The toast was scarcely drunk with all honour to Tim Linkinwater, when
the sturdiest and jolliest subordinate elbowed himself a little
in advance of his fellows, and exhibiting a very hot and flushed
countenance, pulled a singl