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It was full of hurrying people and of grooms who stood in knots beside doorways. They flattened themselves against the walls before the Lord Privy Seal's procession of gentlemen in black with white staves, and the ceilings seemed to send down moulded and gilded stalactites to touch his head. The beefeater before the door of the Lady Mary's lodgings spat upon the ground when he had passed.
"We now," says the guide-book, "retrace our steps to the shops, and then, turning to the left, ascend under the trees up the terraced hill on which stands the Town Hall. It is occupied by the town guard, who wear 'beefeater' costumes of ancient origin." Steps descend in wide flights down the hillside into Blue End.
Some steps just beyond lead into the Wakefield Tower, where the "Crown Jewels" are now kept. The "beefeater" remained below, but Mrs. Pitt took the young people up into the little round room where the splendid crowns and other jewels are seen, behind iron bars.
"Boatmen coming through the Traitor's Gate yonder, used to tie their boats to that ring," the "beefeater" told them. "That shows you 'ow much farther h'up the water came in those days.
They all descended from their vehicle and entered the famous inclosure; and they secured the services of a venerable beefeater, who, though there were many other claimants for legendary information, made a fine exclusive party of them and marched them through courts and corridors, through armories and prisons.
One of those exquisite days when the sunlight penetrates to the heart. Admiral Guépratte, commanding the French Fleet, called at 9.45 and in due course I returned his visit, when I was electrified to find at his cabin door no common sentry but a Beefeater armed with a large battleaxe, dating from about the period of Charlemagne.
"The way is long," she said bravely. Every Beefeater bowed his head. There was a dense crowd round the scaffold. Sophie heeded them not; she ran girlishly up the steps to where the executioner was leaning on his axe. "Where do I put my head?" she asked simply. The executioner pointed to the block. "There!" said he. "Where did you think you put it?" Sophie reproved him with a look and knelt down.
There is not a Lord Chancellor, or Lord Mayor, or Lord of the Chamber, or Master of the Hounds, or Beefeater in Ordinary, or any sort of British bigwig, out of the whole of British Beadledom, upon which the sun never sets, in Elysium. This is the only dignity beyond their reach."
Old Fortune looking like a walking pulpit in a thundercloud I should say he'd make about four of me round the equator; and mind you, a chap stopped me in the street the other day and offered me a job as Beefeater outside a moving-picture show: yes, fact, I was wretchedly annoyed about it and the man Twyning with a lean and hungry look like Cassius, or was it Judas Iscariot?
Potter whisked me away from them somehow, and we passed under the tapestry curtains while one of the two Hungarian bands Mrs. Ess Kay had hired played a waltz which made me long to dance. "This way to the Maze; this way to the Maze," a man dressed like a Beefeater was continually saying.
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