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Oh, I have heard of this affair, a vulgar tavern brawl, the fifth in which his name has been involved and besmirched. I had news this morning by a courier dispatched me by my friend St. Simon, who imagines that I am deeply concerned in that young profligate. I learn that he is out of danger, and that in a month or so, he will be about again and ready to disgrace the name of Canaples afresh.
Evidently he had become involved in some brawl, for an angry woman and others were demanding money of him and he was shouting back drunken threats. A man struck him and the woman got him by the beard. Then his reason left him altogether. "Am I, a Christian, to be treated thus by you heathen dogs?" he screamed. "Oh, you think I am dirt beneath your feet. I have friends, I tell you I have friends.
"Do not injure an innocent man," interposed the Prince, desirous at every sacrifice to preserve his favourite from the menaced danger: "I pledge my word that Ramorny was employed in business of mine, therefore could not be engaged in this brawl." "False equivocator that thou art!" said the King, presenting to the Prince a ring, "behold the signet of Ramorny, lost in the infamous affray!
He did not know what fear was; he was always ready for a fight of any kind; a quarrel in the streets of Madrid, a duel, a fight with a man or a wild beast, a brawl in a tavern or a military expedition, were all the same to him, if only they gave him an opportunity for fighting.
It has been immortalized by his friend, Dr. Gordon Hake, in the following lines addressed to the author of Aylwin in the sonnet-sequence, The New Day: Sitting with him, his tones as Petrarch's tender, With many a speaking vision on the wall, The fire, a-blaze, flashing the studio fender, Closed in from London shouts and ceaseless brawl Twas you brought Nature to the visiting, Till she herself seemed breathing in the room, And Art grew fragrant in the glow of Spring With homely scents of gorse and heather bloom.
They were pushing and staggering, howling and fighting, in reckless disregard of the comfort of others, and before she knew it she was in the midst of a drunken brawl. One rough fellow struck against her, and another trod on Dennis, who started up with a cry of pain.
He stood outside the circle of his companions, supporting the injured left arm with his right hand. He frequently blew upon the burning spot in his flesh, over which a bit of cloth was wrapped, but curiosity concerning the result of this entertaining brawl was stronger than the wish to have it bandaged and healed.
There we read how Bernabo Visconti knighted the victor in a drunken brawl, and then did the same derisively to the vanquished; how Ger- man knights with their decorated helmets and devices were ridiculed and more of the same kind. At a later period Poggio makes merry over the many knights of his day without a horse and without military training.
As is narrated in the contemporary account given below, a simple tavern brawl led to the granting of these extensive privileges. This is one among many examples of the way in which the universities turned similar events to their own advantage. The passage also exhibits a typical conflict between town and gown.
I hear the brawl of a rivulet, and a drink of fresh water were more grateful now than the daintiest hippocras." So saying, he flung himself from his steed; following the sound of the rivulet, he gained its banks, and after quenching his thirst in the hollow of his hand, laid himself down upon the long grass, waving coolly over the margin, and fell into profound thought.
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