The table in Milverton Hall was already surrounded by the hungry guests; and a substantial old English breakfast, well suited to the appetites and the digestion of active and manly hunters, was spread before them. They were so busied over the cold joints and the venison pasties, or with the amber ale that foamed in silver tankards, as scarcely to notice the entrance of a latecomer, and therefore Cuthbert slipped into a vacant place at the bottom of the table, without other greeting than the good-humoured nod of a ruddy-looking young parson seated opposite, as he raised a tankard to his lips. There was little talk, save a few words about the sport, until having fairly finished their meal, the chairs were backed a little from the huge oaken table; the serving men lifted off the large dishes, still weighty with good fare, removed the trenchers, and having carried round the basin and ewer, large silver cups, filled with canary wine, prepared, after the fashion of the time, with sugar and with certain herbs, so as to make a delicious beverage in warm weather, were placed upon the table. The short grace “Benedicto benedicatur” having been uttered by George Juxon, the youthful rector alluded to, Sir Oliver took the massive cup which stood before himself, and intimating to Juxon to follow his example with the other, he rose, and giving for a toast, “His most gracious Majesty King Charles,” took a small draught of it, and passed the cup to the noble looking gentleman who had been sitting on his right hand, and was then standing by his side. The toast passed round with an audible “God bless him!” from every guest, after the example of the loyal host. “Ah, Sir Philip,” observed the worthy knight to the noble stranger near him, “we have fallen upon evil times; and it is grievous to think that there should be one house in all England where the health of his most sacred Majesty may no longer be duly drunk, as is becoming in all good and true subjects.” “Yet, I fear,” replied Sir Philip Arundel, “there are many in which the King’s health is no longer a standing toast: unquestionably republican feelings and principles have made great progress among the burgher classes generally, and have infected not a few above them.” “It is those sour-faced, canting rogues, the prick-eared, psalm-singing Puritans, that are doing all the mischief,” said Sir Charles Lambert: “we want their ears, after the Turkish fashion, cropped by sacksful.” “But it is not calling them names, or cutting off their ears,” said George Juxon, “that will put them down; neither will all the water in your horse-ponds quench the fire in any of their bosoms.” “Very likely; but there is nothing like trying what will stop them; and as sure as ever I catch any of the hypocritical rogues praying and singing near our parish they shall have a bellyful of muddy water, and a back-load of smart blows with whip or cudgel.”