[ 2SO ] 



feat: — a mere wanton trick that will not bear to 

 be bragged of. But to drain a two-gallon bottle 

 without taking it from the Irps, as did a certain la- 

 bourer, is fpoken of as an exploit worthy an inha- 

 bitant of the Vale of Gloucefter! — Another man of 

 the Vale, however, undertook for a trifling wager 

 to drink, twenty pints of cyder, one immediately 

 after another. He got down nineteen, (as the ftory 

 is gravely told) but thefe filling the calk to the 

 bung, the twentieth could not of courfe get admit- 

 tance: fo that a Severn-man's ftomach holds ex- 

 a6tly two gallons three pints! — But the quantity 

 drunk in this extemporaneous way by the men is tri- 

 fling, compared with that which their mailers will 

 fwaliow at a fitting. Four well-leafoned yeomen 

 (well known in the Vale) having raifed their cou- 

 rage with the nefarious juice of the apple, refolved 

 to have a fefli hogdiead tapped; then fetting foot 

 to foot, they entirely emptied it at one fitting !* 



Concerning the effedls of fuch extravao;ant feats 

 performed by thofe mad topers, our author is filent; 

 butiffimilar debauches are frequently committed 

 with impunity (which feems fcarcely credible), they 

 afford a (Ir iking example of the falubrity of cyder, 

 perhaps not to ht paralleled by any other vinous 

 or fermented liquor. At all events fuch wantpn 



• Occonomy of Gloucefterlhirc, vol. i. p. 53» 



exceffes 



