“Bravo, Doctor! Here, waiter, get me another tumbler, and some more gin-punch. What a stunning call. Couldn’t the old bird give us another bit of history? It’s as good as reading ‘Southey’s Life,’ and much funnier,” rattled away the short scholar.
“What a quaint old grisly party it is!” said the long scholar; “I shall stand him a pot of beer.”
“Well, he won’t object to that,” said the Doctor, working away at the beef and pickles.
“Here, waiter, take a pot of beer, with my compliments, over to that gentleman,” said the long scholar, pointing to the old bargeman, “and say how much obliged we are to him for his song.”
So Peter trotted across with the liquor, and the old man telegraphed his acknowledgments.
“By the way, Doctor,” said the short scholar, “as you seem to know a good deal about these things, can you tell me what ‘Vicar of Bray’ means? I saw two men quarrelling just after the games, and it was all their wives could do to keep them from fighting, and I heard it was because one had called the other ‘Vicar of Bray.’”
“It means ‘turn-coat’ in Berkshire,” answered the Doctor. “I didn’t think they used the name now; but I remember the time when it was the common term of reproach. I dare say you know Bray, gentlemen?”
“I should think so,” said the short scholar; “pretty village just below Maidenhead. I pulled by it on my way to town last June.”
“Yes, and it’s hard on such a pretty village to have had such a bad parson,” said the Doctor.
“I say, Doctor, give us the ‘Vicar of Bray,’ now, it will set off some of the singing birds at the other end of the booth; I can see they’re getting into prime piping order.”
“Very good, if you like it,” said the Doctor, pushing away his plate, and taking a finishing pull at his pewter, “only the song is in print, I know, somewhere; so you mustn’t think you’ve found much of a prize, Sir,” added he to me, for my use of pencil and note-book hadn’t escaped him.
“No, Sir,” said I; “but I should like to hear it, of all things.”
So the Doctor, without further preface, began in his jolly clear voice--
In good King Charles’s golden days, When loyalty had no harm in’t, A zealous High-Church man I was, And so I gained preferment. To teach my flock I never missed: Kings were by God appointed; And they are damned who dare resist, Or touch the Lord’s anointed. _Chorus._--And this is law, I will maintain Until my dying day, sir, That whatsoever king shall reign, I’ll be the Vicar of Bray, sir.