either sung, jested, heard
music, nor drank healths; and yet they seemed not the less, in their own
phrase, to enjoy the creature-comforts, which the frailty of humanity
rendered grateful to their outward man. Old Whitaker even protested,
that, though much the smaller party in point of numbers, they discussed
nearly as much sack and claret as his own more jovial associates. But
those who considered the steward's prejudices, were inclined to think,
that, in order to produce such a result, he must have thrown in his
own by-drinkings--no inconsiderable item--to the sum total of the
Presbyterian potations.

Without adopting such a partial and scandalous report, we shall
only say, that on this occasion, as on most others, the rareness of
indulgence promoted the sense of enjoyment, and that those who made
abstinence, or at least moderation, a point of religious principle,
enjoyed their social meeting the better that such opportunities rarely
presented themselves. If they did not actually drink each other's
healths, they at least showed, by looking and nodding to each other as
they raised their glasses, that they all were sharing the same festive
gratification of the appetite, and felt it enhanced, because it was at
the same time enjoyed by their friends and neighbours. Religion, as it
was the principal topic of their thoughts, became also the chief subject
of their conversation, and as they sat together in small separate knots,
they discussed doctrinal and metaphysical points of belief, balanced the
merits of various preachers, compared the creeds of contending sects,
and fortified by scriptural quotations those which they favoured.
Some contests arose in the course of these debates, which might have
proceeded farther than was seemly, but for the cautious interference
of Major Bridgenorth. He suppressed also, in the very bud, a dispute
betwixt Gaffer Hodgeson of Charnelycot and the Reverend Mr. Solsgrace,
upon the tender subject of lay-preaching and lay-ministering; nor did he
think it altogether prudent or decent to indulge the wishes of some of
the warmer enthusiasts of the party, who felt disposed to make the rest
partakers of their gifts in extemporaneous prayer and exposition. These
were absurdities that belonged to the time, which, however, the Major
had sense enough to perceive were unfitted, whether the offspring of
hypocrisy or enthusiasm, for the present time and place.

The Major was also instrumental in breaking