Still he was tolerably prudent and did not task nature too
unreasonably. His exercises were duly moderated, so as not to irritate
anew his injuries. Forrester was a rigid disciplinarian, and it was only
on the fifth day after his arrival, and after repeated entreaties of his
patient, in all of which he showed himself sufficiently _impatient_,
that the honest woodman permitted him to descend to the dinner-table of
the inn, in compliance with the clamorous warning of the huge bell which
stood at the entrance.
The company at the dinner-table was somewhat less numerous than that
assembled in the great hall at the trial of the pedler. Many of the
persons then present were not residents, but visiters in the village
from the neighboring country. They had congregated there, as was usually
the case, on each Saturday of the week, with the view not less to the
procuring of their necessaries, than the enjoyment of good company.
Having attended in the first place to the ostensible objects of their
visit, the village tavern, in the usual phrase, "brought them up;" and
in social, yet wild carousal, they commonly spent the residue of the
day.
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