Page:A Set of Rogues.djvu/147

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DAWSON LIKE TO SPOIL ALL.
133

where), and the Don mighty sombre and grave (as foreseeing an evil outcome of this business), so that he would make no answer to my civilities save by dumb gestures, showing he was highly displeased. But truly 'twas enough to set us all crazy, but he, with joy, to be in possession of all these riches and think that we had landed at Chatham scarce a fortnight before without decent clothes to our backs, and now, but for the success of our design, might be the penniless strolling vagabonds we were when Don Sanchez lighted on us.

Presently Moll came out from the side room with her father, her hair all tumbled, and as rosy as a peach, and she would have us visit the house from top to bottom, showing us the rooms set apart for us, her own chamber, the state room, the dining-hall, the store closets for plate and linen, etc., all prodigious fine and in most excellent condition; for the scrupulous minute care of old Simon had suffered nothing to fall out of repair, the rooms being kept well aired, the pictures, tapestries, and magnificent furniture all preserved fresh with linen covers and the like. From the hall she led us out on to the terrace to survey the park and the gardens about the house, and here, as within doors, all was in most admirable keeping, with no wild growth or runaweeds anywhere, nor any sign of neglect. But I observed, as an indication of the steward's thrifty, unpoetic mind, that the garden beds were planted with onions and such marketable produce, in place of flowers, and that instead of deer grazing upon the green slopes of the park there was only such profitable cattle as sheep, cows, etc. And at the sight of all this abundance of good things (and especially the well-stored buttery), Dawson