'And as for Nelson Collingwood,' Sackville would say, laughing, 'we
couldn't do without him in the house. If he didn't spoil the tapestry we
should be 'over-cushioned in a few months; and whom could we get but him
to drink Laura's home-made wine?' The truth is, the gents who came from
the City to dine at the 'Oval' could not be induced to drink it--in
which fastidiousness, I myself, when I grew to be intimate with the
family, confess that I shared.
'And yet, sir, that green ginger has been drunk by some of England's
proudest heroes,' Mrs. Chuff would exclaim. 'Admiral Lord Exmouth
tasted and praised it, sir, on board Captain Chuff's ship, the
"Nebuchadnezzar," 74, at Algiers; and he had three dozen with turn
in the "Pitchfork" frigate, a part of which was served out to the men
before he went into his immortal action with the "Furibonde," Captain
Choufleur, in the Gulf of Panama.'
All this, though the old dowager told us the story every day when the
wine was produced, never served to get rid of any quantity of it--and
the green ginger, though it had fired British tars for combat and
victory, was not to the taste of us peaceful and degenerate gents of
modern times.
I see Sackville now, as on the occasion when, presented by
Wagley, I paid my first visit to him. It was in July--a Sunday
afternoon--Sackville Maine was coming from church, with his wife on one
arm, and his mother-ill-law (in red tabinet, as usual,) on the other.
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