Chapter 13

Let the proud salmon gorge the feather'd hook,
Then strike, and then you have him--He will wince;
Spin out your line that it shall whistle from you
Some twenty yards or so, yet you shall have him--
Marry! you must have patience--the stout rock
Which is his trust, hath edges something sharp;
And the deep pool hath ooze and sludge enough
To mar your fishing--'less you are more careful.
_Albion, or the Double Kings._

It is seldom that a day of pleasure, upon review, seems altogether so
exquisite as the partaker of the festivity may have felt it while
passing over him. Nigel Olifaunt, at least, did not feel it so, and it
required a visit from his new acquaintance, Lord Dalgarno, to
reconcile him entirely to himself. But this visit took place early
after breakfast, and his friend's discourse was prefaced with a
question, How he liked the company of the preceding evening?

"Why, excellently well," said Lord Glenvarloch; "only I should have
liked the wit better had it appeared to flow more freely. Every man's
invention seemed on the stretch, and each extravagant simile seemed to
set one half of your men of wit into a brown study to produce
something which should out-herod it."

"And wherefore not?" said Lord Dalgarno, "or what are these fellows
fit for, but to play the intellectual gladiators before us? He of them
who declares himself recreant, should, d--n him, be restricted to
muddy ale, and the patronage of the Waterman's Company. I promise you,
that many a pretty fellow has been mortally wounded with a quibble or
a carwitchet at the Mermaid, and sent from thence, in a pitiable
estate, to Wit's hospital in the Vintry, where they languish to this
day amongst fools and aldermen."

"It may be so," said Lord Nigel; "yet I could swear by my honour, that
last night I seemed to be in company with more than one man whose
genius and learning ought either to have placed him higher in our
company, or to have withdrawn him altogether from a scene, where,
sooth to speak, his part seemed unworthily subordinate."

"Now, out upon your tender conscience," said Lord Dalgarno; "and the
fico for such outcasts of Parnassus! Why, these are the very leavings
of that noble banquet of pickled herrings and Rhenish, which lost
London so many of her principal witmongers and bards of misrule. What
would you have said had you seen Nash or Green, when you interest
yourself about the poor mimes you supped with last night? Suffice it,
they had their drench and their doze, and they drank and slept as much
as may save them from any necessity of eating till evening, when, if
they are industrious, they will find patrons or players to