Sir Percevall followed his friend's movements with a careful eye and imitated him as exactly as possible, but he did not escape a coughing fit, from which he emerged with a purple face and tear-filled eyes. "Have another?" said Droop, cheerfully. "A plague on queezy gullets!" growled the knight. "Your spirits sought two ways at once, Master Droop, and like any other half-minded equivocal transaction, contention was the outcome. But for the whiskey, mind you--why, it hath won old Sir Percevall's heart. Zounds, man! Scarce two fingers of it, and yet I feel the wanton laugh in me a'ready. Good fellows need good company, my master! So pour me his fellow! So--so!" They drank again, and this time the more cautious knight escaped all painful consequences. "Look you, Master Droop," said the delighted old toper, leaning back against the wall as he beamed across the table at his companion, "look you! An you have a butt of this same brew, Sir Percevall Hart is your slave, your scullion, your foot-boy! Why, man, 'tis the elixir of life! It warms a body like a maid's first kiss! Whence had you it?" "Oh, they make it by the million gallons a year where I come from," Droop replied. "Have another. Take it with hot water and sugar--I mean honey." The advice was followed, and while they sipped the enlivening decoction, Copernicus explained his plans touching the patenting of his phonograph and bicycle. When he concluded his relation, the knight leaned back and gazed at him with an affectionate squint. "See, now, bully rook, if I take you," he said. "It behooves you to have fair inductance at court. For this ye come to Sir Percevall Hart, her Majesty's harbinger and--though he says so himself--a good friend to Cecil. Now, mark me, lad. Naught do I know or care of thy 'funny craft' or 'bicycle.' Master Bacon is a philosopher and you have here his certificate. Say I well--what?" He paused and Droop nodded. "Good--and so to better. Naught care I, or know I, or should or could I trow, being a man of poetical turn and no base mechanic--no offence meant to yourself, Master Droop. But this I do say--and now mark me well--I say--and dare maintain it (and all shall tell ye that is a fair maintenance and a good champion), that for a sure and favorable inductance to the favors of the court there's no man living takes the wall o' Percevall Hart, Knight!" "Bacon told me as much," said Droop. "And he told thee well, my master. Frank is a good lad, though vain, and his palm itcheth. So to terms, eh? Now, methinks 'twere but equity and good fellowship for two such as we are to go snacks, eh? Cut through the middle--even halves, bully--even halves! How say you?" "You don't mean," said Droop, "that you'd want half the profits, jest fer introducin' me to Lord What's-is-name, do ye?" "With a small retainer, of course, to bind fast. Say--oh, a matter of twenty gold angels or so."