"Hop, Dick, hop!" said she, making the blade flash and glitter evilly,
whereupon the fellow, clutching his wares, made off with sudden
alacrity; but being at a distance he stopped and turned.
"I 'opes," he cried, "I do 'ope as your Adam tires o' ye an' leaves ye
despairin'--danged soon, an' that's for you, Anna! An' I 'opes as she
pokes out both your eyes for ye--both on 'em, mind--an' that's for
you, young whipper-snapper!"
Then he spat towards us, nodded, and hasted off along the road.
"And now, let's have dinner!" said Diana.
"Dinner?" I repeated, frowning after my late antagonist.
"Beef, Peregrine!"
CHAPTER XX
OF THE TONGUE OF A WOMAN AND THE FEET OF A GODDESS
Roast beef is now, has been, and probably will be, long acclaimed and
proclaimed by every true-born Englishman as his own peculiar diet;
_vide_ the old song:
"When mighty Roast Beef was the Englishman's food
It ennobled our hearts and enriched our blood.
O the Roast Beef of Old England
And O for old England's Roast Beef!"
By long association and assimilation it has become, as it were, a
national asset, a very part and parcel of the British constitution.
From ages dim and remote it has gone to the building of a sturdy race
which, by dint of hard knocks and harder heads, has won for itself a
mighty Empire. Our Saxon ancestors devoured it; our Norman conquerors
scorned, tasted and--ate of it; our stout yeomen throve on it; our
squires and gentry hunt, fight, make speeches and laws upon it; and
doubtless future generations shall do the like.
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