"
"It is no fable, as you and your master will find when the king comes to
sift the matter," replied Will. "This will be a richer result to him than
was ever produced by your alchemical experiments, good Signor
Domingo Lamelyn."
"It is false!--I say false!" screamed Patch. " let the cellars be searched,
and I will stake my head nothing is found."
"Stake thy cap, and there may be some meaning in it," said Will,
plucking Patch's cap from his head and elevating it on his truncheon.
"Here is an emblem of the Cardinal of York," he cried, pointing to it.
A roar of laughter from the company followed this sally, and Hob and
Nob looked up in placid wonderment.
"I shall die with laughing," cried Simon Quanden, holding his fat sides,
and addressing his spouse, who was leaning upon his shoulder.
In the meantime Patch sprang to his feet, and, gesticulating with rage
and fury, cried, "Thou hast done well to steal my cap and bells, for they
belong of right to thee. Add my folly to thy own, and thou wilt be a
fitting servant to thy master; or e'en give him the cap, and then there
will be a pair of ye."
"Who is the fool now, I should like to know?" rejoined Will Sommers
gravely.
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