In happy Westerham!

"Ye little lambs that on the green
In gambols innocent are seen
In gleeful chorus hail your queen
Sweet Bet of Westerham!

"Ye feathered----"

"Stop!" exclaimed Alvaston. "Your lambs'll never do, Ben!"

"Od sir, I say egad, why not?"

"Because lambs don't hail 'n' if they could hail their hail would be a
'baa' and being a baa Bet would ha' t' be a sheep t' understand 'em
which Gad forbid, Ben! An' the bottle's with----"

"A sheep sir, a sheep?" spluttered Sir Benjamin. "Malediction! What
d'ye mean?"

"I mean I object t' Betty being turned int' a sheep either by
inference, insinuation or induction--I 'ppeal t' the company!"

Here ensued a heated discussion ending in his lordship's objection
being quashed, whereupon Sir Benjamin, his face redder than ever and
his elegant peruke a little awry, continued:

"Ye feathered songsters blithely sing
Ye snowy lambkins frisk and spring
To Betty let our glasses ring
In joyous Westerham!"

Sir Benjamin sat down amidst loud acclaim, and there immediately
followed a perfervid debate as to the rival merits of the several
authors and finally, amid a scene of great excitement, Mr. Marchdale
was declared the victor.

And now appeared a mighty bowl of punch flanked by pipes and tobacco at
sight of which the company rose in welcome.

"Gentlemen," said Sir Benjamin, grasping silver ladle much as it had
been a sceptre, "the Muses have departed but in their stead behold the
jovial Bacchus with the attendant sprite yclept Virginia. Gentlemen,
it hath been suggested that we shall drink glass and glass and----"

"Damned be he who first cries 'hold enough'!" murmured Alvaston.

"Gentlemen, the night is young, let now the rosy hours pass in joyous
revelry and good-fellowship!"

So the merry riot waxed and waned, tobacco smoke ascended in filmy
wreaths, songs were sung and stories told while ever the glasses filled
and grew empty and the Major, lighting his fifth pipe at a candle,
turned to find Lord Cleeve addressing him low-voiced amid the general
din across a barricade of empty bottles.

"--don't like it Jack," he was saying, "no duty for a gentleman and
King's officer, we're no damned catchpolls ... word hath come in
roundabout way of a Jacobite rebel in these parts.... Two o' my
captains out with search parties ... poor devil!"

Slowly the clamour of voices and laughter died away, the candles burned
low and lower i