Overturned pitchers, and black-jacks, and pewter stoups, and flagons
still cumbered the large oaken table; glasses, those more perishable
implements of conviviality, many of which had been voluntarily
sacrificed by the guests in their enthusiastic pledges to favourite
toasts, strewed the stone floor with their fragments. As for the
articles of plate, lent for the purpose by friends and kinsfolk, those
had been carefully withdrawn so soon as the ostentatious display of
festivity, equally unnecessary and strangely timed, had been made and
ended. Nothing, in short, remained that indicated wealth; all the signs
were those of recent wastefulness and present desolation. The black
cloth hangings, which, on the late mournful occasion, replaced the
tattered moth-eaten tapestries, had been partly pulled down, and,
dangling from the wall in irregular festoons, disclosed the rough
stonework of the building, unsmoothed either by plaster or the chisel.
The seats thrown down, or left in disorder, intimated the careless
confusion which had concluded the mournful revel.
Pages:
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166