This would have
been in itself sufficient to have possessed the company with the
real state of affairs; but the young woman of all work had
prevented the possibility of any misconception arising in the
mind of any gentleman upon the subject, by forcibly dragging
every man's glass away, long before he had finished his beer, and
audibly stating, despite the winks and interruptions of Mr. Bob
Sawyer, that it was to be conveyed downstairs, and washed forthwith.
It is a very ill wind that blows nobody any good. The prim
man in the cloth boots, who had been unsuccessfully attempting
to make a joke during the whole time the round game lasted,
saw his opportunity, and availed himself of it. The instant the
glasses disappeared, he commenced a long story about a great
public character, whose name he had forgotten, making a particularly
happy reply to another eminent and illustrious individual
whom he had never been able to identify. He enlarged at some
length and with great minuteness upon divers collateral circumstances,
distantly connected with the anecdote in hand, but for
the life of him he couldn't recollect at that precise moment what
the anecdote was, although he had been in the habit of telling the
story with great applause for the last ten years.
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