‘Here is your health, sir,’ said the man of the snuff-coloured coat, addressing himself to the one in black; ’I honour you for what you said about the Church of England.  Every one who speaks against the Church of England has my warm heart.  Down with it, I say, and may the stones of it be used for mending the roads, as my friend William says in his Register.’

The man in black, with a courteous nod of his head, drank to the man in the snuff-coloured coat.  ‘With respect to the steeples,’ said he, ’I am not altogether of your opinion; they might be turned to better account than to serve to mend the roads; they might still be used as places of worship, but not for the worship of the Church of England.  I have no fault to find with the steeples, it is the Church itself which I am compelled to arraign; but it will not stand long, the respectable part of its ministers are already leaving it.  It is a bad Church, a persecuting Church.’

‘Whom does it persecute?’ said I.

The man in black glanced at me slightly, and then replied slowly, ’The Catholics.’

‘And do those whom you call Catholics never persecute?’ said I.

‘Never,’ said the man in black.

‘Did you ever read Foxe’s Book of Martyrs?’ said I.

‘He! he!’ tittered the man in black; ’there is not a word of truth in Foxe’s Book of Martyrs.’

‘Ten times more than in the Flos Sanctorum,’ said I.

The man in black looked at me, but made no answer.

’And what say you to the Massacre of the Albigenses and the Vaudois, “whose bones lie scattered on the cold Alp,” or the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes?’

The man in black made no answer.

‘Go to,’ said I; ’it is because the Church of England is not a persecuting church, that those whom you call the respectable part are leaving her; it is because they can’t do with the poor Dissenters what Simon de Montfort did with the Albigenses, and the cruel Piedmontese with the Vaudois, that they turn to bloody Rome; the Pope will no doubt welcome them, for the Pope, do you see, being very much in want, will welcome—­’

‘Hollo!’ said the Radical, interfering, ’what are you saying about the Pope?  I say, hurrah for the Pope; I value no religion three halfpence, as I said before, but if I were to adopt any, it should be the Popish as it’s called, because I conceives the Popish to be the grand enemy of the Church of England, of the beggarly aristocracy, and the borough-monger system, so I won’t hear the Pope abused while I am by.  Come, don’t look fierce.  You won’t fight, you know, I have proved it; but I will give you another chance—­I will fight for the Pope, will you fight against him?’

‘Oh dear me, yes,’ said I, getting up and stepping forward.  ’I am a quiet peaceable young man, and, being so, am always ready to fight against the Pope—­the enemy of all peace and quiet; to refuse fighting for the aristocracy is a widely different thing from refusing to fight against the Pope; so come on, if you are disposed to fight for him.  To the Pope broken bells, to Saint James broken shells.  No Popish vile oppression, but the Protestant succession.  Confusion to the Groyne, hurrah for the Boyne, for the army at Clonmel, and the Protestant young gentlemen who live there as well.’