It was with difficulty, about five o'clock, that we got them ashore again, and half led, half dragged them back to the inn.
"Come," said Hawkesbury to Whipcord, "it's time to be getting the trap ready for the start back, isn't it ?" "Is it?
Go and tell the fellow, some of you," replied our driver.
"I'll be ready pretty soon," said he, moving once more towards the bar.
"You surely aren't going to drink any more," cried I, taking his arm and trying gently to stop him.
He wrenched his arm loose and gave me a push back, saying, "Young prig! what's it to do with you ?" "I think he wants to come too," said Masham.

"Come along, Batchelor." I had positively to run away to elude them, and made the pretext of going to the stable to see after the harnessing of the horse.
When this was done I sought for Hawkesbury.
"Do you think it's safe for Whipcord to drive in the state he's in ?" "Oh, yes.

With a horse like that too.

He's pretending to be a great deal worse than he is, just to horrify you." It seemed ages before we actually started.

Whipcord, in a most quarrelsome humour, had to be dragged almost by force from the bar.
Hawkesbury, at the last moment, discovered that he was going without paying the bill; while Masham, having once made himself comfortable in the bar parlour, flatly refused to be moved, and had finally to be left behind.
The only consolation in this was that I had the tail of the dogcart to myself, which was infinitely preferable to the odious society of Masham.
It was nearly six when we finally started from Windsor and turned our horse's head homeward.