s born to die in his bed can never be hanged.
Where is Spitfire?"

"Here," said a sharp-speaking voice, coming from a precocious young
monkey in a servitor's dress.

"Get me a flagon of canary, and we will wash down the remains of
the pasty."

"But strangers are not admitted after curfew," said the porter.

"And I must be getting to my lodgings," said Martin.

"Tush, tush, didn't you hear that this is Liberty Hall?

"Shut your mouth, Magog--here is something to stop it. This young
warrior just knocked down a bos borealis, who strove to break my
head. Shall I not offer him bread and salt in return?"

The porter offered no further opposition, for the speaker slipped a
coin into his palm as he continued:

"Come this way, this is my den. Not that way, that is spelunca
latronum, a den of robbers."

"Holloa! here is Ralph de Monceux, and with a broken head, as
usual.

"Where didst thou get that, Master Ralph, roaring Ralph?"

Such sounds came from the spelunca latronum."

"At the Quatre Voies, fighting for your honour against a drove of
northern oxen."

"And whom hast thou brought with thee to help thee mend it?"

"The fellow who knocked down the bos who gave it me, as deftly as
any butcher."

"Let us see him."

"What name shall I give thee?" whispered Ralph.

"Martin."

"Martin of--?"

"Martin from Kenilworth," said our bashful hero, blushing.

"Thou didst say thou wert of Sussex?"

"So I am, but I was adopted into the earl's household three years
agone."

"Then he is Northern," said a listener.

"No, he came from Sussex."

"Say where? no tricks upon gentlemen."

"Michelham Priory."

"Michelham Priory. Ah! an acolyte! Tapers, incense, and albs."

"Acolyte be hanged. He does not fight like one at all events."

"Come up into my den.

"Come, Hugh, Percy, Aylmer, Richard, Roger, and we will discuss the
matter deftly over a flagon of canary with eke a flask or two of
sack, in honour of our new acquaintance."

"Nay," said Martin, "now I have seen you safe home, I must go. It
is past curfew. I am a stranger, and should be at my lodgings."

"We will see thee safely home, and improve the occasion by cracking
a few more bovine skulls if we meet them, the northern burring
brutes. Their lingo sickens me, but here we are."

So speaking, he opened the door of the vaulted chamber he called
his "den." It was sparingly furnished, and bore no likeness to the
sort of smoking divan an undergrad of th