d indeed have saved his life from the
vengeance of the sufferer.

"Where shall we banish him?" said Vincent.

"Oh," I replied, "put him out in that back passage; the outer door
is shut; he'll be quite safe;" and to the passage he was therefore
immediately consigned.

It was in this place, the reader will remember, that the hapless Dame du
Chateau was at that very instant in "durance vile." Bedos, who took the
condemned monkey, opened the door, thrust Jocko in, and closed it again.
Meanwhile we resumed our merriment.

"Nunc est bibendum," said Vincent, as Bedos placed the punch on the
table. "Give us a toast, Dartmore."

Lord Dartmore was a young man, with tremendous spirits, which made up
for wit. He was just about to reply, when a loud shriek was heard from
Jocko's place of banishment: a sort of scramble ensued, and the next
moment the door was thrown violently open, and in rushed the terrified
landlady, screaming like a sea-gull, and bearing Jocko aloft upon her
shoulders, from which "bad eminence" he was grinning and chattering with
the fury of fifty devils. She ran twice round the room, and then sunk on
the floor in hysterics. We lost no time in hastening to her assistance;
but the warlike Jocko, still sitting upon her, refused to permit one
of us to approach. There he sat, turning from side to side, showing his
sharp, white teeth, and uttering from time to time the most menacing and
diabolical sounds.

"What the deuce shall we do?" cried Dartmore.

"Do?" said Vincent, who was convulsed with laughter, and yet
endeavouring to speak gravely; "why, watch like L. Opimius, 'ne quid
respublica detrimenti caperet.'"

"By Jove, Pelham, he will scratch out the lady's beaux yeux," cried the
good-natured Dartmore, endeavouring to seize the monkey by the tail, for
which he very narrowly escaped with an unmutilated visage. But the man
who had before suffered by Jocko's ferocity, and whose breast was still
swelling with revenge, was glad of so favourable an opportunity and
excuse for wreaking it. He seized the poker, made three strides to
Jocko, who set up an ineffable cry of defiance, and with a single
blow split the skull of the unhappy monkey in twain. It fell with one
convulsion on the ground, and gave up the ghost.

We then raised the unfortunate landlady, placed her on the sofa, and
Dartmore administered a plentiful potation of the Curacoa punch. By slow
degrees she revived, gave three most doleful suspirations,