my opinions?--Eh?--Lud love you, sir, but you do say some queer
things."

"Well, Mr. Jellyband," said Mr. Hempseed, sententiously, "you know
what the Scriptures say: `Let `im `oo stands take `eed lest `e fall.'"

"But then hark'ee Mr. `Empseed," retorted Jellyband, still
holding his sides with laughter, "the Scriptures didn't know me.  Why,
I wouldn't so much as drink a glass of ale with one o' them murderin'
Frenchmen, and nothin' `d make me change my opinions.  Why!  I've `eard
it said that them frog-eaters can't even speak the King's English, so,
of course, if any of `em tried to speak their God-forsaken lingo to
me, why, I should spot them directly, see!--and forewarned is
forearmed, as the saying goes."

"Aye! my honest friend," assented the stranger cheerfully, "I
see that you are much too sharp, and a match for any twenty Frenchmen,
and here's to your very good health, my worthy host, if you'll do me
the honour to finish this bottle of mine with me."

"I am sure you're very polite, sir," said Mr. Jellyband,
wiping his eyes which were still streaming with the abundance of his
laughter, "and I don't mind if I do."

The stranger poured out a couple of tankards full of wine, and
having offered one to mine host, he took the other himself.

"Loyal Englishmen as we all are," he said, whilst the same humorous
smile played round the corners of his thin lips--"loyal as we are,
we must admit that this at least is one good thing which comes to
us from France."

"Aye! we'll none of us deny that, sir," assented mine host.

"And here's to the best landlord in England, our worthy host,
Mr. Jellyband," said the stranger in a loud tone of voice.

"Hi, hip, hurrah!" retorted the whole company present.  Then
there was a loud clapping of hands, and mugs and tankards made a
rattling music upon the tables to the accompaniment of loud laughter
at nothing in particular, and of Mr. Jellyband's muttered
exclamations:

"Just fancy ME bein' talked over by any God-forsaken
furriner!--What?--Lud love you, sir, but you do say some queer things."

To which obvious fact the stranger heartily assented.  It was
certainly a preposterous suggestion that anyone could ever upset Mr.
Jellyband's firmly-rooted opinions anent the utter worthlessness of
the inhabitants of the whole continent of Europe.

CHAPTER III             THE REFUGEES

Feeling in every part of England certainly ran very high at
this time against the French and their doings.  Smugglers and
legitimate traders between the French and the English coasts brought
snatches of news from over the water, which made every honest
Englishman's blood boil, and made him long to have "a good go" at
those murderers, who had imprisoned their king and all his family,
subjected the queen and the royal children to every species of
indignity, and were even now loudly demanding the blood of the whole
Bourbon family and of every one of its adherents.

The execution of the Princesse de Lamballe, Marie Antoinette's
young and charming friend, had filled every one in England with
unspeakable horror, the daily execution of scores of royalists of good
family, whose only sin was their aristocratic name, seemed to cry for
vengeance to the whole of civilised Europe.

Yet, with all that, no one dared to interfere.  Burke had
exhausted all his eloquence in trying to induce the British Government
to fight the revolutionary government of France, but Mr. Pitt, with
characteristic prudence, did not feel that this country was fit yet to
embark on another arduous and costly war.  It was for Austria to take
the initiative; Austria, whose fairest daughter was even now a
dethroned queen, imprisoned and insulted by a howling mob; surely
'twas not--so argued Mr. Fox--for the whole of England to take up
arms, because one set of Frenchmen chose to murder another.

As for Mr. Jellyband and his fellow John Bulls, though they
looked upon all foreigners with withering contempt, they were royalist
and anti-revolutionists to a man, and at this present moment were
furious with Pitt for his caution and moderation, although they
naturally understood nothing of the diplomatic reasons which guided
that great man's policy.

By now Sally came running back, very excited and very eager.
The joyous company in the coffee-room had heard nothing of the noise
outside, but she had spied a dripping horse and rider who had stopped
at the door of "The Fisherman's Rest," and while the stable boy ran
forward to take charge of the horse, pretty Miss Sally went to the
front door to greet the welcome visitor.
"I think I see'd my Lord Antony's horse out in the yard,
father," she said, as she ran across the coffee-room.

But already the door had been thrown open from outside, and the
next moment an arm, covered in drab cloth and dripping with the heavy
rain, was round pretty Sally's waist, while a hearty voice echoed
along the polished rafters of the coffee-room.