Chapter I. The birth of the Prince and the Pauper.
In the ancient city of London, on a certain autumn day in
the second quarter of the sixteenth century, a boy was born
to a poor family of the name of Canty, who did not want him.
On the same day another English child was born to a rich
family of the name of Tudor, who did want him. All England
wanted him too. England had so longed for him, and hoped
for him, and prayed God for him, that, now that he was
really come, the people went nearly mad for joy. Mere
acquaintances hugged and kissed each other and cried.
Everybody took a holiday, and high and low, rich and poor,
feasted and danced and sang, and got very mellow; and they
kept this up for days and nights together. By day, London
was a sight to see, with gay banners waving from every
balcony and housetop, and splendid pageants marching along.
By night, it was again a sight to see, with its great
bonfires at every corner, and its troops of revellers making
merry around them. There was no talk in all England but of
the new baby, Edward Tudor, Prince of Wales, who lay lapped
in silks and satins, unconscious of all this fuss, and not
knowing that great lords and ladies were tending him and
watching over him—and not caring, either. But there was no
talk about the other baby, Tom Canty, lapped in his poor
rags, except among the family of paupers whom he had just
come to trouble with his presence.
Chapter II. Tom's early life.
Let us skip a number of years.
London was fifteen hundred years old, and was a great
town—for that day. It had a hundred thousand
inhabitants—some think double as many. The streets were
very narrow, and crooked, and dirty, especially in the part
where Tom Canty lived, which was not far from London Bridge.
The houses were of wood, with the second story projecting
over the first, and the third sticking its elbows out beyond
the second. The higher the houses grew, the broader they
grew. They were skeletons of strong criss-cross beams, with
solid material between, coated with plaster. The beams were
painted red or blue or black, according to the owner's
taste, and this gave the houses a very picturesque look.
The windows were small, glazed with little diamond-shaped
panes, and they opened outward, on hinges, like doors.
The house which Tom's father lived in was up a foul
little pocket called Offal Court, out of Pudding Lane. It
was small, decayed, and rickety, but it was packed full of
wretchedly poor families. Canty's tribe occupied a room on
the third floor. The mother and father had a sort of
bedstead in the corner; but Tom, his grandmother, and his
two sisters, Bet and Nan, were not restricted—they had all
the floor to themselves, and might sleep where they chose.
There were the remains of a blanket or two, and some
bundles of ancient and dirty straw, but these could not
rightly be called beds, for they were not organised; they
were kicked into a general pile, mornings, and selections
made from the mass at night, for service.
Bet and Nan were fifteen years old—twins. They were good-hearted
girls, unclean, clothed in rags, and profoundly ignorant.
Their mother was like them. But the father and the
grandmother were a couple of fiends. They got drunk
whenever they could; then they fought each other or anybody
else who came in the way; they cursed and swore always,
drunk or sober; John Canty was a thief, and his mother a
beggar. They made beggars of the children, but failed to
make thieves of them. Among, but not of, the dreadful
rabble that inhabited the house, was a good old priest whom
the King had turned out of house and home with a pension of
a few farthings, and he used to get the children aside and
teach them right ways secretly. Father Andrew also taught
Tom a little Latin, and how to read and write; and would
have done the same with the girls, but they were afraid of
the jeers of their friends, who could not have endured such
a queer accomplishment in them.
All Offal Court was just such another hive as Canty's
house. Drunkenness, riot and brawling were the order, there,
every night and nearly all night long. Broken heads were as
common as hunger in that place. Yet little Tom was not
unhappy. He had a hard time of it, but did not know it. It
was the sort of time that all the Offal Court boys had,
therefore he supposed it was the correct and comfortable
thing. When he came home empty-handed at night, he knew his
father would curse him and thrash him first, and that when
he was done the awful grandmother would do it all over again
and improve on it; and that away in the night his starving
mother would slip to him stealthily with any miserable scrap
or crust she had been able to save for him by going hungry
herself, notwithstanding she was often caught in that sort
of treason and soundly beaten for it by her husband.
No, Tom's life went along well enough, especially in summer. He only
begged just enough to save himself, for the laws against
mendicancy were stringent, and the penalties heavy; so he
put in a good deal of his time listening to good Father
Andrew's charming old tales and legends about giants and
fairies, dwarfs and genii, and enchanted castles, and
gorgeous kings and princes. His head grew to be full of
these wonderful things, and many a night as he lay in the
dark on his scant and offensive straw, tired, hungry, and
smarting from a thrashing, he unleashed his imagination and
soon forgot his aches and pains in delicious picturings to
himself of the charmed life of a petted prince in a regal
palace. One desire came in time to haunt him day and night:
it was to see a real prince, with his own eyes. He spoke
of it once to some of his Offal Court comrades; but they
jeered him and scoffed him so unmercifully that he was glad
to keep his dream to himself after that.
He often read the priest's old books and got him to explain and enlarge
upon them. His dreamings and readings worked certain
changes in him, by- and-by. His dream-people were so fine
that he grew to lament his shabby clothing and his dirt, and
to wish to be clean and better clad. He went on playing in
the mud just the same, and enjoying it, too; but, instead of
splashing around in the Thames solely for the fun of it, he
began to find an added value in it because of the washings
and cleansings it afforded.
Tom could always find something going on around the
Maypole in Cheapside, and at the fairs; and now and then he
and the rest of London had a chance to see a military parade
when some famous unfortunate was carried prisoner to the
Tower, by land or boat. One summer's day he saw poor Anne
Askew and three men burned at the stake in Smithfield, and
heard an ex- Bishop preach a sermon to them which did not
interest him. Yes, Tom's life was varied and pleasant
enough, on the whole.
By-and-by Tom's reading and dreaming about princely life wrought such a
strong effect upon him that he began to ACT the prince,
unconsciously. His speech and manners became curiously
ceremonious and courtly, to the vast admiration and
amusement of his intimates. But Tom's influence among these
young people began to grow now, day by day; and in time he
came to be looked up to, by them, with a sort of wondering
awe, as a superior being. He seemed to know so much! and he
could do and say such marvellous things! and withal, he was
so deep and wise! Tom's remarks, and Tom's performances,
were reported by the boys to their elders; and these, also,
presently began to discuss Tom Canty, and to regard him as a
most gifted and extraordinary creature. Full-grown people
brought their perplexities to Tom for solution, and were
often astonished at the wit and wisdom of his decisions. In
fact he was become a hero to all who knew him except his own
family—these, only, saw nothing in him.
Privately, after a while, Tom organised a royal court! He was the
prince; his special comrades were guards, chamberlains,
equerries, lords and ladies in waiting, and the royal
family. Daily the mock prince was received with elaborate
ceremonials borrowed by Tom from his romantic readings;
daily the great affairs of the mimic kingdom were discussed
in the royal council, and daily his mimic highness issued
decrees to his imaginary armies, navies, and viceroyalties.
After which, he would go forth in his rags and beg a few
farthings, eat his poor crust, take his customary cuffs and
abuse, and then stretch himself upon his handful of foul
straw, and resume his empty grandeurs in his dreams.
And still his desire to look just once upon a real
prince, in the flesh, grew upon him, day by day, and week by
week, until at last it absorbed all other desires, and
became the one passion of his life.
One January day, on his usual begging tour, he tramped despondently up
and down the region round about Mincing Lane and Little East
Cheap, hour after hour, bare-footed and cold, looking in at
cook-shop windows and longing for the dreadful pork-pies and
other deadly inventions displayed there—for to him these
were dainties fit for the angels; that is, judging by the
smell, they were—for it had never been his good luck to own
and eat one. There was a cold drizzle of rain; the
atmosphere was murky; it was a melancholy day. At night Tom
reached home so wet and tired and hungry that it was not
possible for his father and grandmother to observe his
forlorn condition and not be moved—after their fashion;
wherefore they gave him a brisk cuffing at once and sent him
to bed. For a long time his pain and hunger, and the
swearing and fighting going on in the building, kept him
awake; but at last his thoughts drifted away to far,
romantic lands, and he fell asleep in the company of
jewelled and gilded princelings who live in vast palaces,
and had servants salaaming before them or flying to execute
their orders. And then, as usual, he dreamed that HE was a
princeling himself.
All night long the glories of his royal estate shone upon
him; he moved among great lords and ladies, in a blaze of
light, breathing perfumes, drinking in delicious music, and
answering the reverent obeisances of the glittering throng
as it parted to make way for him, with here a smile, and
there a nod of his princely head.
And when he awoke in the morning and looked upon the
wretchedness about him, his dream had had its usual
effect—it had intensified the sordidness of his surroundings
a thousandfold. Then came bitterness, and heart-break, and
tears.
Chapter III. Tom's meeting with the Prince.
Tom got up hungry, and sauntered hungry away, but with
his thoughts busy with the shadowy splendours of his night's
dreams. He wandered here and there in the city, hardly
noticing where he was going, or what was happening around
him. People jostled him, and some gave him rough speech;
but it was all lost on the musing boy. By-and-by he found
himself at Temple Bar, the farthest from home he had ever
travelled in that direction. He stopped and considered a
moment, then fell into his imaginings again, and passed on
outside the walls of London. The Strand had ceased to be a
country-road then, and regarded itself as a street, but by a
strained construction; for, though there was a tolerably
compact row of houses on one side of it, there were only
some scattered great buildings on the other, these being
palaces of rich nobles, with ample and beautiful grounds
stretching to the river—grounds that are now closely packed
with grim acres of brick and stone.
Tom discovered Charing Village presently, and rested
himself at the beautiful cross built there by a bereaved
king of earlier days; then idled down a quiet, lovely road,
past the great cardinal's stately palace, toward a far more
mighty and majestic palace beyond—Westminster. Tom stared in
glad wonder at the vast pile of masonry, the wide-spreading
wings, the frowning bastions and turrets, the huge stone
gateway, with its gilded bars and its magnificent array of
colossal granite lions, and other the signs and symbols of
English royalty. Was the desire of his soul to be satisfied
at last? Here, indeed, was a king's palace. Might he not
hope to see a prince now—a prince of flesh and blood, if
Heaven were willing?
At each side of the gilded gate stood a living
statue—that is to say, an erect and stately and motionless
man-at-arms, clad from head to heel in shining steel armour.
At a respectful distance were many country folk, and people
from the city, waiting for any chance glimpse of royalty
that might offer. Splendid carriages, with splendid people
in them and splendid servants outside, were arriving and
departing by several other noble gateways that pierced the
royal enclosure.
Poor little Tom, in his rags, approached, and was moving
slowly and timidly past the sentinels, with a beating heart
and a rising hope, when all at once he caught sight through
the golden bars of a spectacle that almost made him shout
for joy. Within was a comely boy, tanned and brown with
sturdy outdoor sports and exercises, whose clothing was all
of lovely silks and satins, shining with jewels; at his hip
a little jewelled sword and dagger; dainty buskins on his
feet, with red heels; and on his head a jaunty crimson cap,
with drooping plumes fastened with a great sparkling gem.
Several gorgeous gentlemen stood near—his servants, without
a doubt. Oh! he was a prince—a prince, a living prince, a
real prince—without the shadow of a question; and the prayer
of the pauper-boy's heart was answered at last.
Tom's breath came quick and short with excitement, and
his eyes grew big with wonder and delight. Everything gave
way in his mind instantly to one desire: that was to get
close to the prince, and have a good, devouring look at him.
Before he knew what he was about, he had his face against
the gate-bars. The next instant one of the soldiers
snatched him rudely away, and sent him spinning among the
gaping crowd of country gawks and London idlers. The
soldier said,—
"Mind thy manners, thou young beggar!"
The crowd jeered and laughed; but the young prince sprang
to the gate with his face flushed, and his eyes flashing
with indignation, and cried out,—
"How dar'st thou use a poor lad like that? How dar'st
thou use the King my father's meanest subject so? Open the
gates, and let him in!"
You should have seen that fickle crowd snatch off their hats then. You
should have heard them cheer, and shout, "Long live the
Prince of Wales!"
The soldiers presented arms with their halberds, opened
the gates, and presented again as the little Prince of
Poverty passed in, in his fluttering rags, to join hands
with the Prince of Limitless Plenty.
Edward Tudor said—
"Thou lookest tired and hungry: thou'st been treated
ill. Come with me."
Half a dozen attendants sprang forward to—I don't know
what; interfere, no doubt. But they were waved aside with a
right royal gesture, and they stopped stock still where they
were, like so many statues. Edward took Tom to a rich
apartment in the palace, which he called his cabinet. By
his command a repast was brought such as Tom had never
encountered before except in books. The prince, with
princely delicacy and breeding, sent away the servants, so
that his humble guest might not be embarrassed by their
critical presence; then he sat near by, and asked questions
while Tom ate.
"What is thy name, lad?"
"Tom Canty, an' it please thee, sir."
"'Tis an odd one. Where dost live?"
"In the city, please thee, sir. Offal Court, out of
Pudding Lane."
"Offal Court! Truly 'tis another odd one. Hast
parents?"
"Parents have I, sir, and a grand-dam likewise that is
but indifferently precious to me, God forgive me if it be
offence to say it—also twin sisters, Nan and Bet."
"Then is thy grand-dam not over kind to thee, I take it?"
"Neither to any other is she, so please your worship.
She hath a wicked heart, and worketh evil all her days."
"Doth she mistreat thee?"
"There be times that she stayeth her hand, being asleep
or overcome with drink; but when she hath her judgment clear
again, she maketh it up to me with goodly beatings."
A fierce look came into the little prince's eyes, and he
cried out—
"What! Beatings?"
"Oh, indeed, yes, please you, sir."
"BEATINGS!—and thou so frail and little. Hark ye:
before the night come, she shall hie her to the Tower. The
King my father"—
"In sooth, you forget, sir, her low degree. The Tower is
for the great alone."
"True, indeed. I had not thought of that. I will
consider of her punishment. Is thy father kind to thee?"
"Not more than Gammer Canty, sir."
"Fathers be alike, mayhap. Mine hath not a doll's
temper. He smiteth with a heavy hand, yet spareth me: he
spareth me not always with his tongue, though, sooth to say.
How doth thy mother use thee?"
"She is good, sir, and giveth me neither sorrow nor pain
of any sort. And Nan and Bet are like to her in this."
"How old be these?"
"Fifteen, an' it please you, sir."
"The Lady Elizabeth, my sister, is fourteen, and the Lady
Jane Grey, my cousin, is of mine own age, and comely and
gracious withal; but my sister the Lady Mary, with her
gloomy mien and—Look you: do thy sisters forbid their
servants to smile, lest the sin destroy their souls?"
"They? Oh, dost think, sir, that THEY have servants?"
The little prince contemplated the little pauper gravely
a moment, then said—
"And prithee, why not? Who helpeth them undress at
night? Who attireth them when they rise?"
"None, sir. Would'st have them take off their garment,
and sleep without—like the beasts?"
"Their garment! Have they but one?"
"Ah, good your worship, what would they do with more?
Truly they have not two bodies each."
"It is a quaint and marvellous thought! Thy pardon, I
had not meant to laugh. But thy good Nan and thy Bet shall
have raiment and lackeys enow, and that soon, too: my
cofferer shall look to it. No, thank me not; 'tis nothing.
Thou speakest well; thou hast an easy grace in it. Art
learned?"
"I know not if I am or not, sir. The good priest that is
called Father Andrew taught me, of his kindness, from his
books."
"Know'st thou the Latin?"
"But scantly, sir, I doubt."
"Learn it, lad: 'tis hard only at first. The Greek is
harder; but neither these nor any tongues else, I think, are
hard to the Lady Elizabeth and my cousin. Thou should'st
hear those damsels at it! But tell me of thy Offal Court.
Hast thou a pleasant life there?"
"In truth, yes, so please you, sir, save when one is
hungry. There be Punch-and-Judy shows, and monkeys—oh such
antic creatures! and so bravely dressed!—and there be plays
wherein they that play do shout and fight till all are
slain, and 'tis so fine to see, and costeth but a
farthing—albeit 'tis main hard to get the farthing, please
your worship."
"Tell me more."
"We lads of Offal Court do strive against each other with
the cudgel, like to the fashion of the 'prentices,
sometimes."
The prince's eyes flashed. Said he—
"Marry, that would not I mislike. Tell me more."
"We strive in races, sir, to see who of us shall be
fleetest."
"That would I like also. Speak on."
"In summer, sir, we wade and swim in the canals and in
the river, and each doth duck his neighbour, and splatter
him with water, and dive and shout and tumble and—"
"'Twould be worth my father's kingdom but to enjoy it
once! Prithee go on."
"We dance and sing about the Maypole in Cheapside; we
play in the sand, each covering his neighbour up; and times
we make mud pastry—oh the lovely mud, it hath not its like
for delightfulness in all the world!—we do fairly wallow in
the mud, sir, saving your worship's presence."
"Oh, prithee, say no more, 'tis glorious! If that I
could but clothe me in raiment like to thine, and strip my
feet, and revel in the mud once, just once, with none to
rebuke me or forbid, meseemeth I could forego the crown!"
"And if that I could clothe me once, sweet sir, as thou
art clad—just once—"
"Oho, would'st like it? Then so shall it be. Doff thy
rags, and don these splendours, lad! It is a brief
happiness, but will be not less keen for that. We will have
it while we may, and change again before any come to
molest."
A few minutes later the little Prince of Wales was garlanded with Tom's
fluttering odds and ends, and the little Prince of Pauperdom
was tricked out in the gaudy plumage of royalty. The two
went and stood side by side before a great mirror, and lo, a
miracle: there did not seem to have been any change made!
They stared at each other, then at the glass, then at each
other again. At last the puzzled princeling said—
"What dost thou make of this?"
"Ah, good your worship, require me not to answer. It is
not meet that one of my degree should utter the thing."
"Then will _I_ utter it. Thou hast the same hair, the
same eyes, the same voice and manner, the same form and
stature, the same face and countenance that I bear. Fared
we forth naked, there is none could say which was you, and
which the Prince of Wales. And, now that I am clothed as
thou wert clothed, it seemeth I should be able the more
nearly to feel as thou didst when the brute soldier—Hark ye,
is not this a bruise upon your hand?"
"Yes; but it is a slight thing, and your worship knoweth
that the poor man-at-arms—"
"Peace! It was a shameful thing and a cruel!" cried the
little prince, stamping his bare foot. "If the King—Stir
not a step till I come again! It is a command!"
In a moment he had snatched up and put away an article of
national importance that lay upon a table, and was out at
the door and flying through the palace grounds in his
bannered rags, with a hot face and glowing eyes. As soon as
he reached the great gate, he seized the bars, and tried to
shake them, shouting—
"Open! Unbar the gates!"
The soldier that had maltreated Tom obeyed promptly; and
as the prince burst through the portal, half-smothered with
royal wrath, the soldier fetched him a sounding box on the
ear that sent him whirling to the roadway, and said—
"Take that, thou beggar's spawn, for what thou got'st me
from his Highness!"
The crowd roared with laughter. The prince picked
himself out of the mud, and made fiercely at the sentry,
shouting—
"I am the Prince of Wales, my person is sacred; and thou
shalt hang for laying thy hand upon me!"
The soldier brought his halberd to a present-arms and
said mockingly—
"I salute your gracious Highness." Then angrily—"Be off,
thou crazy rubbish!"
Here the jeering crowd closed round the poor little prince, and hustled
him far down the road, hooting him, and shouting—
"Way for his Royal Highness! Way for the Prince of
Wales!"
Chapter IV. The Prince's troubles begin.
After hours of persistent pursuit and persecution, the
little prince was at last deserted by the rabble and left to
himself. As long as he had been able to rage against the
mob, and threaten it royally, and royally utter commands
that were good stuff to laugh at, he was very entertaining;
but when weariness finally forced him to be silent, he was
no longer of use to his tormentors, and they sought
amusement elsewhere. He looked about him, now, but could not
recognise the locality. He was within the city of
London—that was all he knew. He moved on, aimlessly, and in
a little while the houses thinned, and the passers-by were
infrequent. He bathed his bleeding feet in the brook which
flowed then where Farringdon Street now is; rested a few
moments, then passed on, and presently came upon a great
space with only a few scattered houses in it, and a
prodigious church. He recognised this church. Scaffoldings
were about, everywhere, and swarms of workmen; for it was
undergoing elaborate repairs. The prince took heart at
once—he felt that his troubles were at an end, now. He said
to himself, "It is the ancient Grey Friars' Church, which
the king my father hath taken from the monks and given for a
home for ever for poor and forsaken children, and new-named
it Christ's Church. Right gladly will they serve the son of
him who hath done so generously by them—and the more that
that son is himself as poor and as forlorn as any that be
sheltered here this day, or ever shall be."
He was soon in the midst of a crowd of boys who were
running, jumping, playing at ball and leap-frog, and
otherwise disporting themselves, and right noisily, too.
They were all dressed alike, and in the fashion which in
that day prevailed among serving-men and 'prentices{1}—that
is to say, each had on the crown of his head a flat black
cap about the size of a saucer, which was not useful as a
covering, it being of such scanty dimensions, neither was it
ornamental; from beneath it the hair fell, unparted, to the
middle of the forehead, and was cropped straight around; a
clerical band at the neck; a blue gown that fitted closely
and hung as low as the knees or lower; full sleeves; a broad
red belt; bright yellow stockings, gartered above the knees;
low shoes with large metal buckles. It was a sufficiently
ugly costume.
The boys stopped their play and flocked about the prince,
who said with native dignity—
"Good lads, say to your master that Edward Prince of
Wales desireth speech with him."
A great shout went up at this, and one rude fellow said—
"Marry, art thou his grace's messenger, beggar?"
The prince's face flushed with anger, and his ready hand
flew to his hip, but there was nothing there. There was a
storm of laughter, and one boy said—
"Didst mark that? He fancied he had a sword—belike he is
the prince himself."
This sally brought more laughter. Poor Edward drew
himself up proudly and said—
"I am the prince; and it ill beseemeth you that feed upon
the king my father's bounty to use me so."
This was vastly enjoyed, as the laughter testified. The
youth who had first spoken, shouted to his comrades—
"Ho, swine, slaves, pensioners of his grace's princely
father, where be your manners? Down on your marrow bones,
all of ye, and do reverence to his kingly port and royal
rags!"
With boisterous mirth they dropped upon their knees in a
body and did mock homage to their prey. The prince spurned
the nearest boy with his foot, and said fiercely—
"Take thou that, till the morrow come and I build thee a
gibbet!"
Ah, but this was not a joke—this was going beyond fun.
The laughter ceased on the instant, and fury took its
place. A dozen shouted—
"Hale him forth! To the horse-pond, to the horse-pond!
Where be the dogs? Ho, there, Lion! ho, Fangs!"
Then followed such a thing as England had never seen
before—the sacred person of the heir to the throne rudely
buffeted by plebeian hands, and set upon and torn by dogs.
As night drew to a close that day, the prince found himself far down in
the close-built portion of the city. His body was bruised,
his hands were bleeding, and his rags were all besmirched
with mud. He wandered on and on, and grew more and more
bewildered, and so tired and faint he could hardly drag one
foot after the other. He had ceased to ask questions of
anyone, since they brought him only insult instead of
information. He kept muttering to himself, "Offal
Court—that is the name; if I can but find it before my
strength is wholly spent and I drop, then am I saved—for his
people will take me to the palace and prove that I am none
of theirs, but the true prince, and I shall have mine own
again." And now and then his mind reverted to his treatment
by those rude Christ's Hospital boys, and he said, "When I
am king, they shall not have bread and shelter only, but
also teachings out of books; for a full belly is little
worth where the mind is starved, and the heart. I will keep
this diligently in my remembrance, that this day's lesson be
not lost upon me, and my people suffer thereby; for learning
softeneth the heart and breedeth gentleness and charity."
{1}
The lights began to twinkle, it came on to rain, the wind
rose, and a raw and gusty night set in. The houseless
prince, the homeless heir to the throne of England, still
moved on, drifting deeper into the maze of squalid alleys
where the swarming hives of poverty and misery were massed
together.
Suddenly a great drunken ruffian collared him and said—
"Out to this time of night again, and hast not brought a farthing home,
I warrant me! If it be so, an' I do not break all the bones
in thy lean body, then am I not John Canty, but some other."
The prince twisted himself loose, unconsciously brushed
his profaned shoulder, and eagerly said—
"Oh, art HIS father, truly? Sweet heaven grant it be
so—then wilt thou fetch him away and restore me!"
"HIS father? I know not what thou mean'st; I but know I
am THY father, as thou shalt soon have cause to—"
"Oh, jest not, palter not, delay not!—I am worn, I am
wounded, I can bear no more. Take me to the king my father,
and he will make thee rich beyond thy wildest dreams.
Believe me, man, believe me!—I speak no lie, but only the
truth!—put forth thy hand and save me! I am indeed the
Prince of Wales!"
The man stared down, stupefied, upon the lad, then shook
his head and muttered—
"Gone stark mad as any Tom o' Bedlam!"—then collared him
once more, and said with a coarse laugh and an oath, "But
mad or no mad, I and thy Gammer Canty will soon find where
the soft places in thy bones lie, or I'm no true man!"
With this he dragged the frantic and struggling prince
away, and disappeared up a front court followed by a
delighted and noisy swarm of human vermin.
