When Duke Hildebrod had ended his song, he informed his Peers that a
worthy officer of the Temple attended them, and commanded the captain
and parson to abandon their easy chairs in behalf of the two
strangers, whom he placed on his right and left hand. The worthy
representative of the army and the church of Alsatia went to place
themselves on a crazy form at the bottom of the table, which, ill
calculated to sustain men of such weight, gave way under them, and the
man of the sword and man of the gown were rolled over each other on
the floor, amidst the exulting shouts of the company. They arose in
wrath, contending which should vent his displeasure in the loudest and
deepest oaths, a strife in which the parson's superior acquaintance
with theology enabled him greatly to excel the captain, and were at
length with difficulty tranquillised by the arrival of the alarmed
waiters with more stable chairs, and by a long draught of the cooling
tankard. When this commotion was appeased, and the strangers
courteously accommodated with flagons, after the fashion of the others
present, the Duke drank prosperity to the Temple in the most gracious
manner, together with a cup of welcome to Master Reginald Lowestoffe;
and, this courtesy having been thankfully accepted, the party honoured
prayed permission to call for a gallon of Rhenish, over which he
proposed to open his business.
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