Vanity Fair - Page 287/573

"I think you were speaking of dogs killing rats," Pitt remarked mildly,

handing his cousin the decanter to "buzz."

"Killing rats was I? Well, Pitt, are you a sporting man? Do you want to

see a dawg as CAN kill a rat? If you do, come down with me to Tom

Corduroy's, in Castle Street Mews, and I'll show you such a bull-terrier

as--Pooh! gammon," cried James, bursting out laughing at his

own absurdity--"YOU don't care about a dawg or rat; it's all nonsense.

I'm blest if I think you know the difference between a dog and a duck."

"No; by the way," Pitt continued with increased blandness, "it was

about blood you were talking, and the personal advantages which people

derive from patrician birth. Here's the fresh bottle."

"Blood's the word," said James, gulping the ruby fluid down. "Nothing

like blood, sir, in hosses, dawgs, AND men. Why, only last term, just

before I was rusticated, that is, I mean just before I had the measles,

ha, ha--there was me and Ringwood of Christchurch, Bob Ringwood, Lord

Cinqbars' son, having our beer at the Bell at Blenheim, when the

Banbury bargeman offered to fight either of us for a bowl of punch. I

couldn't. My arm was in a sling; couldn't even take the drag down--a

brute of a mare of mine had fell with me only two days before, out with

the Abingdon, and I thought my arm was broke. Well, sir, I couldn't

finish him, but Bob had his coat off at once--he stood up to the

Banbury man for three minutes, and polished him off in four rounds

easy. Gad, how he did drop, sir, and what was it? Blood, sir, all

blood."

"You don't drink, James," the ex-attache continued. "In my time at

Oxford, the men passed round the bottle a little quicker than you young

fellows seem to do."

"Come, come," said James, putting his hand to his nose and winking at

his cousin with a pair of vinous eyes, "no jokes, old boy; no trying it

on on me. You want to trot me out, but it's no go. In vino veritas,

old boy. Mars, Bacchus, Apollo virorum, hey? I wish my aunt would send

down some of this to the governor; it's a precious good tap."

"You had better ask her," Machiavel continued, "or make the best of

your time now. What says the bard? 'Nunc vino pellite curas, Cras

ingens iterabimus aequor,'" and the Bacchanalian, quoting the above

with a House of Commons air, tossed off nearly a thimbleful of wine

with an immense flourish of his glass.

At the Rectory, when the bottle of port wine was opened after dinner,

the young ladies had each a glass from a bottle of currant wine. Mrs.

Bute took one glass of port, honest James had a couple commonly, but as

his father grew very sulky if he made further inroads on the bottle,

the good lad generally refrained from trying for more, and subsided

either into the currant wine, or to some private gin-and-water in the

stables, which he enjoyed in the company of the coachman and his pipe.

At Oxford, the quantity of wine was unlimited, but the quality was

inferior: but when quantity and quality united as at his aunt's house,

James showed that he could appreciate them indeed; and hardly needed

any of his cousin's encouragement in draining off the second bottle

supplied by Mr. Bowls.