NIC. FROG.--The counsel are fee'd, and all things prepared for a trial; thou shalt be forced to stand the issue; it shall be pleaded in thy name as well as mine. Go home if thou canst; the gates are shut, the turnpikes locked, and the roads barricaded.* * Difficulty of the march of part of the army to Dunkirk. JOHN BULL.--Even these very ways, Nic., that thou toldest me were as open to me as thyself, if I can't pass with my own equipage, what can I expect for my goods and wagons? I am denied passage through those very grounds that I have purchased with my own money. However, I am glad I have made the experiment; it may serve me in some stead. John Bull was so overjoyed that he was going to take possession of Ecclesdown, that nothing could vex him. "Nic.," quoth he, "I am just a-going to leave thee; cast a kind look upon me at parting." Nic. looked sour and glum, and would not open his mouth. JOHN BULL.--I wish thee all the success that thy heart can desire, and that these honest gentlemen of the long robe may have their belly full of law. Nic. could stand it no longer, but flung out of the room with disdain, and beckoned the lawyers to follow him. JOHN BULL.--B'ye, b'ye, Nic,; not one poor smile at parting? won't you shake your day-day, Nic? b'ye, Nic.--With that John marched out of the common road, across the country, to take possession of Ecclesdown. CHAPTER XXII. Of the great joy that John expressed when he got possession of Ecclesdown.* * Dunkirk. When John had got into his castle he seemed like Ulysses upon his plank after he had been well soused in salt water, who, as Homer says, was as glad as a judge going to sit down to dinner after hearing a long cause upon the bench. I daresay John Bull's joy was equal to that of either of the two; he skipped from room to room, ran up-stairs and down-stairs, from the kitchen to the garrets, and from the garrets to the kitchen; he peeped into every cranny; sometimes he admired the beauty of the architecture and the vast solidity of the mason's work; at other times he commended the symmetry and proportion of the rooms. He walked about the gardens; he bathed himself in the canal, swimming, diving, and beating the liquid element like a milk-white swan. The hall resounded with the sprightly violin and the martial hautbois. The family tripped it about, and capered like hailstones bounding from a marble floor. Wine, ale, and October flew about as plentifully as kennel-water. Then a frolic took John in the head to call up some of Nic. Frog's pensioners that had been so mutinous in his family. JOHN BULL.--Are you glad to see your master in Ecclesdown Castle? ALL.--Yes, indeed, sir. JOHN BULL.--Extremely glad? ALL.--Extremely glad, sir. JOHN BULL.--Swear to me that you are so. Then they began to sink their souls to the lowest pit if any person in the world rejoiced more than they did.