These players were a high-spirited, light-hearted, genial crew. The incident in which they had been concerned in nowise affected their gaiety. They lived in and for the moment; they took life as it came to them; theirs was the sovereign faculty of being able to lay care aside. They were prone to set all sorts of tricks upon one another, and to crack jokes and tell tales at one another’s expense. They seemed to have no particular respect for anybody, not even for Shakespeare himself, but Anne and Gervase noticed that only one man in all that merry, careless company ever ventured to break a lance with him. Richard Burbage was the man in question. The tragedian was a short, powerfully-made man, with a solemn face of much good-humor and an organ-like voice that was both rich and deep. When the playwright and his friend crossed swords, which they did pretty frequently, the whole table would cease to ply knife and spoon in order that it might attend the combat. These duellos, to be sure, were carried off in the highest style of pleasantry, but the play was very keen while it lasted. The dramatist sat at one end of the long table, and his trusty henchman at the other. “They do tell me,” said the tragedian, in his slow, rolling speech, and bestowing a wink on those that were near him, “that this plaguy piece we have all got to play in for our sins this plaguy afternoon is the work of a certain court gallant by the name of William Shakespeare.” At this, the dramatist at the other end of the table laid down his knife very deliberately, and after gazing around as if in search of a thing he could not see, said, “I wonder whence that growl proceeds. I do believe there is a dog in the room. Young Parflete”--this to the youngest and smallest member of the company--“young Parflete, I will thank you to pitch it out with your foot behind it.” “A friend,” proceeded the tragedian, in a very audible whisper for all that he spoke behind his hand, “of the Queen’s most gracious majesty. This is no reflection upon the Queen, still it must have been a sore trial to her friendship when such a burden was laid upon it.” “Yes, it is a dog,” said the dramatist, very gravely. “One of those brindled, flop-eared, yellow-coated, squab-bellied mongrels by the sound of it. It is the kind of dog that is only fit for a blind pedlar to trundle at the end of a string. Hi, Thomas!”--addressing a servant who had entered with a dish--“there is a dog in the room.” “I don’t see it, sir,” said the servant, looking round. “Oh, but there is, I tell you. One of those squat brutes all body and no legs. One of those half-begotten starvelings that lies all day by the hob and whines all night to the moon.” “I see no dog, sir.” “Have you looked under the table, Thomas?” Thomas looked under the table, but still could see no dog. “But I heard it, man, I tell you. There is no mistaking such a voice as that.” “There is no dog here, sir,” the servant assured him, solemnly.