All this was
novel and strange to the cloister-bred youth; but most
interesting of all was the motley circle of guests who sat eating
their collops round the blaze. They were a humble group of
wayfarers, such as might have been found that night in any inn
through the length and breadth of England; but to him they
represented that vague world against which he had been so
frequently and so earnestly warned. It did not seem to him from
what he could see of it to be such a very wicked place after all.
Three or four of the men round the fire were evidently
underkeepers and verderers from the forest, sunburned and
bearded, with the quick restless eye and lithe movements of the
deer among which they lived. Close to the corner of the chimney
sat a middle-aged gleeman, clad in a faded garb of Norwich cloth,
the tunic of which was so outgrown that it did not fasten at the
neck and at the waist. His face was swollen and coarse, and his
watery protruding eyes spoke of a life which never wandered very
far from the wine-pot. A gilt harp, blotched with many stains
and with two of its strings missing, was tucked under one of his
arms, while with the other he scooped greedily at his platter.
Pages:
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81