Meanwhile the three merchants, delighted with the turn things had taken, skipped round us laughing, and now hounded him on, now bantered me with 'how is that for the Duke of Orleans ?' and 'How now, traitor ?' When I thought that this had lasted long enough--or, to speak more plainly, when I could stand the innkeeper's drubbing no longer--I threw him off, and struggled to my feet; but still, though the blood was trickling down my face, I refrained from drawing my sword.

I caught up instead a leg of the stool which lay handy, and, watching my opportunity, dealt the landlord a shrewd blow under the ear, which laid him out in a moment on the wreck of his own table.
'Now,' I cried, brandishing my new weapon, which fitted the hand to a nicety, 'come on! Come on! if you dare to strike a blow, you peddling, truckling, huckstering knaves! A fig for you and your shaveling Cardinal!' The red-faced wine merchant drew his sword in a one-two.
'Why, you drunken fool,' he said wrathfully, 'put that stick down, or I will spit you like a lark!' 'Lark in your teeth!' I cried, staggering as if the wine were in my head.

'And cuckoo, too! Another word, and I--' He made a couple of savage passes at me, but in a twinkling his sword flew across the room.
'VOILA!' I shouted, lurching forward, as if I had luck and not skill to thank for my victory.

'Now, the next! Come on, come on--you white-livered knaves!' And, pretending a drunken frenzy, I flung my weapon bodily amongst them, and seizing the nearest, began to wrestle with him.
In a moment they all threw themselves upon me, and, swearing copiously, bore me back to the door.

The wine merchant cried breathlessly to the woman to open it, and in a twinkling they had me through it, and half-way across the road.