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54 on me, and said, ‘A priest gives up much, too much.’ I daresay she will give me a place about the palace.” And with this hopeful reflection his mind was eased, and, being now at the entrance of the banqueting-hall, he thanked his conductor, and ran hastily with joyful eyes to Margaret. He came in sight of the table—she was gone. Peter was gone too. Nobody was at the table at all; only a citizen in sober garments had just tumbled under it dead drunk, and several persons were raising him to carry him away. Gerard never guessed how important this solemn drunkard was to him: he was looking for “Beauty,” and let “the beast” lie. He ran wildly round the hall, which was now comparatively empty. She was not there. He left the palace: outside he found a crowd gaping at two great fanlights just lighted over the gate. He asked them earnestly if they had seen an old man in a gown, and a lovely girl pass out. They laughed at the question. “They were staring at these new lights that turn night into day. They didn’t trouble their heads about old men and young wenches, every day sights.” From another group he learned there was a mystery being played under canvas hard by, and all the world gone to see it. This revived his hopes, and he went and saw the mystery. In this representation divine personages, too sacred for me to name here, came clumsily down from heaven to talk sophistry with the cardinal virtues, the nine muses, and the seven deadly sins, all present in human shape, and not unlike one another. To enliven which weary stuff in rattled the prince of the power of the air, and an imp that kept molesting him and buffeting him with a bladder, at each thwack of which the crowd were in ecstacies. When the vices had uttered good store of obscenity and the virtues twaddle, the celestials, including the nine muses, went gingerly back to heaven one by one; for there was but one cloud; and two artisans worked it up with its supernatural freight, and worked it down with a winch, in full sight of the audience. These disposed of, the bottomless pit opened and flamed in the centre of the stage: the carpenters and virtues shoved the vices in, and the virtues and Beelzebub and his tormentor danced merrily round the place of eternal torture to the fife and tabor.

This entertainment was writ by the Bishop of Ghent for the diffusion of religious sentiment by the aid of the senses, and was an average specimen of theatrical exhibitions so long as they were in the hands of the clergy. But, alas! in course of time the laity conducted plays, and so the theatre, my reverend friends inform me, has become profane.

Margaret was nowhere in the crowd, and Gerard could not enjoy the performance: he actually went away in Act 2, in the midst of a much admired piece of dialogue, in which Justice out-quibbled Satan. He walked through many streets, but could not find her he sought. At last, fairly worn out, he went to a hostelry and slept till daybreak. All that day, heavy and heartsick, he sought her, but could never fall in with her or her father, nor ever obtain the slightest clue. Then he felt she was false, or had changed her mind. He was irritated now, as well as sad.

More good fortune fell on him: he almost hated it. At last on the third day, after he had once more been through every street, he said “She is not in the town, and I shall never see her again. I will go home.” He started for Tergou with royal favour promised, with fifteen golden angels in his purse, a golden medal on his bosom, and a heart like a lump of lead.

cook has informed us that there are precisely 131 different varieties of wine which a gentleman may put upon his table without a blush. Now, in the year 1854—the last year from which the returns are at hand—it appears that Port, Sherry, and Marsala form, together, no less than 86 per cent. of the entire consumption of the British Islands. In that year there were imported into this country precisely 6,775,858 gallons of wine, and the contributions of the various wine-growing countries stand, proportionally, as follows:—

An insignificant amount of wine “from other countries” is lumped in with the Sicilian contribution; in all other respects, the figures are exactly those of a dry official return. We Englishmen stick to our Port and Sherry, despite the attractions of the secondary wines of France and Germany. France, pre-eminently the home of the vine, and the skilled manufacturer of the diviner drinks which alleviate the trials of suffering humanity, supplies us with a trifle more than eight per cent. of our entire consumption. In other words, for every eight bottles of Claret and Champagne and Burgundy and Hermitage drunk in these islands, we uncork and consume about thirty-nine bottles of Sherry and thirty-seven bottles of Port. One is scarcely prepared for such a conclusion, for within the last twenty years there appears to have occurred a remarkable change in the character of the wines served at the houses of the opulent classes. The absence of the claret-jug after dinner at the table of a professional man or merchant in London would now be remarked. Twenty years ago, its presence would have been regarded as a phenomenon, and as a proof of hidden opulence or of the recklessness of approaching bankruptcy.

How is this? Is the explanation beer?—or gin?—or habit?—or tea and coffee?—or a damp climate?—or the duty of 5s. 9d. per gallon? It is very much the fashion to attribute the result to the last cause, and to assume that if a duty of 1s. were substituted for the 5s. 9d. duty, we should all become drinkers of the lighter and cheaper wines of Germany and France. It is doubtful if this be so. The leading houses in the wine-trade have for the last half century over and over again made experiments as to the possibility of bringing the lighter wines of the continent into fashion, and these experiments have universally failed.