A conversation now ensuing between a gentleman commoner, whom the party
designated Pontius Pilate{23} and Tom Echo, relative to the comparative
merits of their hunters, afforded me an opportunity of surveying
the _larium_ of my friend; the entrance to which was through a short
passage, that served the varied purposes of an ante-room or
vestibule, and a scout's pantry and boot-closet. On the right was the
sleeping-room, and at the foot of a neat French bed I could perceive the
wine bin, surrounded by a regiment of _dead men_{24} who had, no doubt,
departed this life like heroes in some battle of Bacchanalian sculls.
The principal chamber, the very _penetrale_ of the Muses, was about six
yards square, and low, with a rich carved oaken wainscoting, reaching to
the ceiling; the monastic gloom being materially increased by two narrow
loopholes, intended for windows, but scarcely yielding sufficient light
to enable the student to read his _Scapula or Lexicon_{25} with
the advantage of a meridian sun: the fire-place was immensely wide,
emblematical, no doubt, of the capacious stomachs of the good fathers
and fellows, the ancient inhabitants of this _sanctum_; but the
most singularly-striking characteristic was the modern decorations,
introduced by the present occupant.
23 A quaint cognomen applied to him from the rapidity with
which he boasted of repeating the Nicene Creed,--i.
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