d,
a confidence in that bright countenance, which, like the shield of
the British Prince, [Prince Arthur.--See "The Faerie Queene."] seemed
possessed with a spell to charm into impotence the evil spirits who
menaced its possessor.

"Well, sir," said his friend, the gypsy, who had in his turn been
surveying with admiration the sinewy and agile frame of his young guest,
"well, sir, how fares your appetite? Old Dame Bingo will be mortally
offended if you do not do ample justice to her good cheer."

"If so," answered our traveller, who, young as he was, had learnt
already the grand secret of making in every situation a female friend,
"if so, I shall be likely to offend her still more."

"And how, my pretty master?" said the old crone with an iron smile.

"Why, I shall be bold enough to reconcile matters with a kiss, Mrs.
Bingo," answered the youth.

"Ha! Ha!" shouted the tall gypsy; "it is many a long day since my old
Mort slapped a gallant's face for such an affront. But here come our
messmates. Good evening, my mumpers; make your bows to this gentleman
who has come to bowse with us to-night. 'Gad, we'll show him that old
ale's none the worse for keeping company with the moon's darlings. Come,
sit down, sit down. Where's the cloth, ye ill-mannered loons, and the
knives and platters? Have we no holiday customs for strangers, think
ye? Mim, my cove, off to my caravan; bring out the knives, and all other
rattletraps; and harkye, my cuffin, this small key opens the inner hole,
where you will find two barrels; bring one of them. I'll warrant it of
the best, for the brewer himself drank some of the same sort but two
hours before I nimm'd them. Come, stump, my cull, make yourself wings.
Ho, Dame Bingo, is not that pot of thine seething yet? Ah, my young
gentleman, you commence betimes; so much the better; if love's a
summer's day, we all know how early a summer morning begins," added
the jovial Egyptian in a lower voice (feeling perhaps that he was only
understood by himself), as he gazed complacently on the youth, who, with
that happy facility of making himself everywhere at home so uncommon
to his countrymen, was already paying compliments suited to their
understanding to two fair daughters of the tribe who had entered with
the new-comers. Yet had he too much craft or delicacy, call it which you
will, to continue his addresses to that limit where ridicule or jealousy
from the male part of the assemblage might commence; on