Kenilworth | Page 8

might be discontented with that which I can get at home,
methinks I should go but on a fool's errand. Besides, I warrant you,
there is many a fool can turn his nose up at good drink without ever
having been out of the smoke of Old England; and so ever gramercy
mine own fireside."
"This is but a mean mind of yours, mine host," said the stranger; "I
warrant me, all your town's folk do not think so basely. You have
gallants among you, I dare undertake, that have made the Virginia

voyage, or taken a turn in the Low Countries at least. Come, cudgel
your memory. Have you no friends in foreign parts that you would
gladly have tidings of?"
"Troth, sir, not I," answered the host, "since ranting Robin of
Drysandford was shot at the siege of the Brill. The devil take the
caliver that fired the ball, for a blither lad never filled a cup at midnight!
But he is dead and gone, and I know not a soldier, or a traveller, who is
a soldier's mate, that I would give a peeled codling for."
"By the Mass, that is strange. What! so many of our brave English
hearts are abroad, and you, who seem to be a man of mark, have no
friend, no kinsman among them?"
"Nay, if you speak of kinsmen," answered Gosling, "I have one wild
slip of a kinsman, who left us in the last year of Queen Mary; but he is
better lost than found."
"Do not say so, friend, unless you have heard ill of him lately. Many a
wild colt has turned out a noble steed.--His name, I pray you?"
"Michael Lambourne," answered the landlord of the Black Bear; "a son
of my sister's--there is little pleasure in recollecting either the name or
the connection."
"Michael Lambourne!" said the stranger, as if endeavouring to recollect
himself--"what, no relation to Michael Lambourne, the gallant cavalier
who behaved so bravely at the siege of Venlo that Grave Maurice
thanked him at the head of the army? Men said he was an English
cavalier, and of no high extraction."
"It could scarcely be my nephew," said Giles Gosling, "for he had not
the courage of a hen-partridge for aught but mischief."
"Oh, many a man finds courage in the wars," replied the stranger.
"It may be," said the landlord; "but I would have thought our Mike
more likely to lose the little he had."

"The Michael Lambourne whom I knew," continued the traveller, "was
a likely fellow--went always gay and well attired, and had a hawk's eye
after a pretty wench."
"Our Michael," replied the host, "had the look of a dog with a bottle at
its tail, and wore a coat, every rag of which was bidding good-day to
the rest."
"Oh, men pick up good apparel in the wars," replied the guest.
"Our Mike," answered the landlord, "was more like to pick it up in a
frippery warehouse, while the broker was looking another way; and, for
the hawk's eye you talk of, his was always after my stray spoons. He
was tapster's boy here in this blessed house for a quarter of a year; and
between misreckonings, miscarriages, mistakes, and misdemeanours,
had he dwelt with me for three months longer, I might have pulled
down sign, shut up house, and given the devil the key to keep."
"You would be sorry, after all," continued the traveller, "were I to tell
you poor Mike Lambourne was shot at the head of his regiment at the
taking of a sconce near Maestricht?"
"Sorry!--it would be the blithest news I ever heard of him, since it
would ensure me he was not hanged. But let him pass--I doubt his end
will never do such credit to his friends. Were it so, I should
say"--(taking another cup of sack)--"Here's God rest him, with all my
heart."
"Tush, man," replied the traveller, "never fear but you will have credit
by your nephew yet, especially if he be the Michael Lambourne whom
I knew, and loved very nearly, or altogether, as well as myself. Can you
tell me no mark by which I could judge whether they be the same?"
"Faith, none that I can think of," answered Giles Gosling, "unless that
our Mike had the gallows branded on his left shoulder for stealing a
silver caudle-cup from Dame Snort of Hogsditch."
"Nay, there you lie like a knave, uncle," said the stranger, slipping

aside his ruff; and turning down the sleeve of his doublet from his neck
and shoulder; "by this good day, my shoulder is as unscarred as thine
own.
"What, Mike, boy--Mike!" exclaimed the host;--"and is it thou, in good
earnest? Nay, I have judged so for this half-hour; for I knew no other