"I tell you I'm no Jesuit, but a loyal London 'prentice, on a message for my master to Oxford.

If you hold it English that twenty men should set upon one, then--" "What! a plague on you!" cried my opponent, before I could finish.

"Why did you not say what you were before?
We have something better to do than hang 'prentices.

Get you gone--a stick to your back is what you want, unmannerly dog." "Fetch it then," said I, "for before I leave here I shall finish my supper, and if you like not my company, you may go elsewhere." I think they were abashed at that, for they tried to laugh it off, and go on with their carouse.

Indeed I think they meant only to frighten me all the while, so perhaps I was a fool to take it all in earnest.
However that be, I finished my supper and bade them all good-night; whereat they laughed again.