They were obliged to join him in his "prosnics" or carousals, and to drink "
potations pottle deep." His carousals, too, were not of the most quiet kind, nor were his
potations as mild as nectar.
Potations, pottle deep, again went round; never did beverage excite greater glee, or meet with more rapturous commendation.
So far from doing him any harm, these nightly
potations brightened Nutty up, gave him heart, and enabled him to endure life in this hole of a place.
The tooth-drawer and the gleeman called for a cup of small ale apiece, and started off together for Ringwood fair, the old jongleur looking very yellow in the eye and swollen in the face after his overnight
potations. The archer, however, who had drunk more than any man in the room, was as merry as a grig, and having kissed the matron and chased the maid up the ladder once more, he went out to the brook, and came back with the water dripping from his face and hair.
This solemn proceeding always took place in the afternoon of the day succeeding his return; perhaps, because the boys acquired strength of mind from the suspense of the morning, or, possibly, because Mr Squeers himself acquired greater sternness and inflexibility from certain warm
potations in which he was wont to indulge after his early dinner.
He also eschews hot
potations, and addicts himself to a tankard of ale, which is brought him by the barmaid.
Chillip's own brain, under his
potations of negus, to divert his attention from this topic to his own affairs, on which, for the next half-hour, he was quite loquacious; giving me to understand, among other pieces of information, that he was then at the Gray's Inn Coffee-house to lay his professional evidence before a Commission of Lunacy, touching the state of mind of a patient who had become deranged from excessive drinking.
This amusement is superintended by the Friar, according to the recurrence of certain fustian words, to be repeated by every compotator in turn before he drank a species of High Jinks, as it were, by which they regulated their
potations, as toasts were given in latter times.
For as this is the liquor of modern historians, nay, perhaps their muse, if we may believe the opinion of Butler, who attributes inspiration to ale, it ought likewise to be the
potation of their readers, since every book ought to be read with the same spirit and in the same manner as it is writ.
No man was seen to drink by himself, nor in any instance was more than one vessel considered necessary for the same beverage; but the glass or the mug was passed from hand to hand until a chasm in the line or a regard to the rights of ownership would regularly restore the dregs of the
potation to him who de frayed the cost.