They stayed long in the kitchen with Burchell, drinking, shouting, singing, and keeping it up; and the sound of their merry minstrelsy kept me a kind of company.

The night fell, and the shine of the fire brightened and blinked on the panelled wall.

Our illuminated windows must have been visible not only from the back lane of which Fenn had spoken, but from the court where the farmers' gig awaited them.

In the far end of the firelit room lay my companions, the one silent, the other clamorously noisy, the images of death and drunkenness.

Little wonder if I were tempted to join in the choruses below, and sometimes could hardly refrain from laughter, and sometimes, I believe, from tears--so unmitigated was the tedium, so cruel the suspense, of this period.
At last, about six at night, I should fancy, the noisy minstrels appeared in the court, headed by Fenn with a lantern, and knocking together as they came.