The Duke of Beaufort's houseparty was falling to pieces. Rain had kept the guests cooped up in Badminton Manor, champagne was running low, old friends were so bored with each other that they were reduced to a half-forgotten childhood game. Someone stretched a cord across one of the manor corridors, and, so the story goes, a couple of lackadaisical wine-bibbers discovered that they still had energy enough to stick a crest of goose quills into a champagne cork. They began to bat the cork back & forth across the cord with empty bottles. Suddenly the party came to life. The makeshift...
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