A Knight for a Night

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The opening scene of the story discloses our "Knight," in company with a party of convivial spirits, worshiping at the Shrine of Bacchus. At the close of the drinking bout, in which he displayed his superior capacity by putting his companions one after another under the table, we see him on his way home, considerably befuddled and a bit unsteady in his gait, but mellow and happy of mood. Through the deserted streets of Edinburgh town he leisurely steers his uncertain course, scandalizing the watch by his boisterous good humor, and finally turns into a deserted coach yard. There, seated upon the steps of a dilapidated old stage coach that is fast approaching the last stages of decay, he begins to moralize on the departed glories of its bygone days, and the effects of the night's potions beginning to work upon him, he falls asleep. As the clock is striking two he finds to his astonishment that he is surrounded by quaintly dressed people, and that the decayed relic of other generations has been supplanted by a handsome new coach and a spanking pair of horses. He sees a fair maiden struggling in the toils of two desperate villains who are forcing her into the coach, and. true "Knight" that he is, he resolves to champion her cause. Forcing his way into the coach with her and her captors and foiling their attempts to dispose of him with their swords, he remains at her side until the coach pulls up before an old deserted house. Following the party inside, he attacks and. after a brief but furious struggle, disarms the villains, and with the maiden's assistance pins them to the wall like jumping-jacks. With the maiden safely inside the coach again, he mounts the driver's seal and lashes the horses into a furious gallop to escape from the villains' friends who are pursuing on horses, Mile after mile, o'er hill and down dale, the pursuit continues, our brave "Knight" finally landing the lady in the coach yard safe from her pursuers. She is on the point of rewarding with a kiss his chivalry and devotion, when he wakes up to find himself struggling half way in and half way out of the old coach.