And now the ladies, with their gay plumage, have flown away like foreign birds of passage, and the jolly old priests of Bacchus, in the parlour, make their libations of claret; and the young fellows, after a while, seeing a gathering of painted fans, and rustling hoops, and fluttering laces, upon the lawn, and a large immigration of hilarious neighbours besides, and two serious fiddlers, and a black fellow with a tambourine preparing for action, and the warm glitter of the western sun among the green foliage about the window, could stand it no longer, but stole away, notwithstanding a hospitable remonstrance and a protest from old Strafford, to join the merry muster. 'The young bucks will leave their claret,' said Lord Castlemallard; 'and truly 'tis a rare fine wine, colonel, a mighty choice claret truly (and the colonel bowed low, and smiled a rugged purple smile in spite of himself, for his claret _was_ choice), all won't do when Venus beckons--when she beckons--ha, ha--all won't do, Sir--at the first flutter of a petticoat, and the invitation of a pair of fine eyes--fine eyes, colonel--by Jupiter, they're off--you can't keep 'em--I say your wine won't keep 'em--they'll be off, Sir--peeping under the hoods, the dogs will--and whispering their wicked nonsense, Dr. Walsingham--ha, ha--and your wine, I say--your claret, colonel, won't hold 'em--'twas once so with us--eh, general?--ha! ha! and we must forgive 'em now.' And he shoved round his chair lazily, with a left-backward wheel, so as to command the window, for he liked to see the girls dance, the little rogues!--with his claret and his French rappee at his elbow; and he did not hear General Chattesworth, who was talking of the new comedy called the 'Clandestine Marriage,' and how 'the prologue touches genteelly on the loss of three late geniuses--Hogarth, Quin, and Cibber--and the epilogue is the picture of a polite company;' for the tambourine and the fiddles were going merrily, and the lasses and lads in motion.