half-boarder, and haunts the threshold so long 'till he forces good nature to the necessity of a quarrel. Publick invitations he will not wrong with his absence, and is the best witness of the sheriff's hospitality.[28] Men shun him at length as they would do an infection, and he is never crossed in his way if there be but a lane to escape him. He has done with the age as his clothes to him, hung on as long as he could, and at last drops off. FOOTNOTES: [27] We learn from Harrison's _Description of England_, prefixed to Holinshed, that _eleven o'clock_ was the usual time for dinner during the reign of Elizabeth. "With vs the nobilitie, gentrie, and students, doo ordinarilie go to dinner at _eleuen before noone_, and to supper at fiue, or between fiue and six at afternoon." (vol. i. page 171. edit. 1587.) The alteration in manners at this time is rather singularly evinced, from a passage immediately following the above quotation, where we find that _merchants_ and _husbandmen_ dined and supped at a _later hour than the nobility_. [28] Alluding to the public dinners given by the sheriff at particular seasons of the year. So in _The Widow_, a comedy, 4to. 1652. "And as at a _sheriff's table_, O blest custome! A poor indebted gentleman may dine, Feed well, and without fear, and depart so." XV. A CARRIER Is his own hackney-man; for he lets himself out to travel as well as his horses. He is the ordinary embassador between friend and friend, the father and the son, and brings rich presents to the one, but never returns any back again. He is no unlettered man, though in shew simple; for questionless, he has much in his budget, which he can utter too in fit time and place. He is [like] the vault[29] in Gloster church, that conveys whispers at a distance, for he takes the sound out of your mouth at York, and makes it be heard as far as London. He is the young student's joy and expectation, and the most accepted guest, to whom they lend a willing hand to discharge him of his burden. His first greeting is commonly, _Your friends are well_; [_and to prove it_][30] in a piece of gold delivers their blessing. You would think him a churlish blunt fellow, but they find in him many tokens of humanity. He is a great afflicter of the high-ways, and beats them out of measure; which injury is sometimes revenged by the purse-taker, and then the voyage miscarries. No man domineers more in his inn, nor calls his host unreverently with more presumption, and this arrogance proceeds out of the strength of his horses. He forgets not his load where he takes his ease, for he is drunk commonly before he goes to bed. He is like the prodigal child, still packing away and still returning again. But let him pass. FOOTNOTES: