To>f draw's visit to pi\f. brook. 195 



tion of the Crown — no such wine ever came before into 

 this country, no such has followed it. We shall discuss 

 the brace to-day — what better opportunity? Here is Mc- 

 Tavish, its originator, the best judge in the land ! Frank 

 Forester, who has sipped of the like at Crockie's, and a 

 place or two beside, which we could mention — myself, who 

 am not slow at any decent tipple, and Thomas Draw, who 

 knows it, I suppose, from Jarsey Cider!" 



"Yes, and I knows it from the Jarsey champagne tew — 

 which you stick into poor chaps, what you fancies doesn't 

 know no better — give me some more of that ere mutton 

 and some jelly — you are most darned sparin' of your jelly 

 now — and Timothy, you snoopin rascal, fill this ere 

 thimbleful agin with that Creawn wine!" 



Wild fowl succeeded, cooked to a turn, hot claret didy 

 qualified with cayenne in a sauce-boat by their side — 

 washed down by the last flask of Mac's champagne, of 

 which the last round we qualified sorrowfully, as in duty 

 bound, to the importer's health, and to the memory of the 

 crowned head departed — the only crown, as Harry in his 

 funeral oration, truly and pithily observed, which gives 

 the lie to the assertion that "uneasy lies the head that 

 wears a crown." 



No womanish display of pastry marred the unity of this 

 most solemn masculine repast, a Stilton cheese, a red her- 

 ring, with Goshen butter, pilot bread, and porter, con- 

 cluded the rare banquet. A plate of devilled biscut, and a 

 magnum of Latonr, furnished forth the dessert, which we 

 discussed right jovially; while Timothy, after removing 

 Harry's guns from their post of honor above the mantel- 

 piece to their appropriate cases, stole away to the stable 

 to prepare his cattle. 



"Now, boys," said Harry, "make the most of your time. 

 There is the claret, the best in my opinion going — for I 

 have always prized Mac's black-sealed Latour far above 

 Lynch's Margaux — yes, even above that of '25. For 

 Lynch's wine, though exquisitely delicate, was perilous 

 thin; I never tasted it without assenting to Serjeant 

 Bothwell's objection, 'Claret's ower cauld for my stamach,' 

 and desiring like him to qualify it 'wi' a tass of eau di vie.' 

 Now this wine has no such fault, it has a body — " 



"I don't know, Archer," interrupted Tom, "what that 

 ere sarjeant meant with his darned o di vee, but I know 



