Two Penniless Princesses [40]
Dame Lilias; and if you say your prayers with all your heart to be guarded from sin and temptation, and led into the path that is fittest for you, trust that our blessed Master and our Lady will lead you. Have you the Pater Noster in the vulgar tongue?' she added.
'We--we had it once ere my father's death. And Father Malcolm taught us; but we have since been so cast about that--that--I have forgotten.'
'Ah! Father Malcolm taught you,' and Esclairmonde took the girl's hand. 'You know how much I owe to Father Malcolm,' she softly added, as she led the maiden to a carved rood at the end of the cloister, and, before it, repeated the vernacular version of the Lord's Prayer till Eleanor knew it perfectly, and promised to follow up her 'Pater Nosters' with it.
And from that time there certainly was a different tone and spirit in Eleanor.
David, urged by his father, who still publicly ignored the young Douglas, persuaded him to write to his father now that there could be no longer any danger of pursuit, and the messenger Sir Patrick was sending to the King would afford the last opportunity. George growled and groaned a good deal, but perhaps Father Romuald pressed the duty on him in confession, for in his great relief at his lady's going off unplighted from London, he consented to indite, in the chamber Father Romuald shared with two of the Cardinal's chaplains, in a crooked and crabbed calligraphy and language much more resembling Anglo- Saxon than modern English, a letter to the most high and mighty, the Yerl of Angus, 'these presents.'
But when he was entreated to assume his right position in the troop, he refused. 'Na, na, Davie,' he said, 'gin my father chooses to send me gear and following, 'tis all very weel, but 'tisna for the credit of Scotland nor of Angus that the Master should be ganging about like a land-louper, with a single laddie after him--still less that he should be beholden to the Drummonds.'
'Ye would win to the speech of the lassie,' suggested David, 'gin that be what ye want!'
'Na kenning me, she willna look at me. Wait till I do that which may gar her look at me,' said the chivalrous youth.
He was not entirely without means, for the links of a gold chain which he had brought from home went a good way in exchange, and though he had spoken of being at his own charges, he had found himself compelled to live as one of the train of the princesses, who were treated as the guests first of the Duke of York, then of the Cardinal, who had given Sir Patrick a sum sufficient to defray all possible expenses as far as Bourges, besides having arranged for those of the journey with Suffolk whose rank had been raised to that of a Marquis, in honour of his activity as proxy for the King.
CHAPTER 6
THE PRICE OF A GOOSE
'We would have all such offenders cut off, and we give express charge that, in the marches through the country, there be nothing compelled from the villages.' --King Henry V.
The Marquis of Suffolk's was a slow progress both in England and abroad, with many halts both on account of weather and of feasts and festivals. Cardinal Beaufort had hurried the party away from London partly in order to make the match with Margaret of Anjou irrevocable, partly for the sake of removing Eleanor of Scotland, the only maiden who had ever produced the slightest impression on the monastic-minded Henry of Windsor.
When once out of London there were, however, numerous halts on the road,--two or three days of entertainment at every castle, and then a long delay at Canterbury to give time for Suffolk's retainers, and all the heralds, pursuivants, and other adjuncts of pomp and splendour, to join them. They were the guests of Archbishop Stafford, one of the peace party, and a friend of Beaufort and Suffolk, so that their entertainment was costly and magnificent, as befitted the mediaeval notions of a high-born gentleman, Primate of all England. A great
'We--we had it once ere my father's death. And Father Malcolm taught us; but we have since been so cast about that--that--I have forgotten.'
'Ah! Father Malcolm taught you,' and Esclairmonde took the girl's hand. 'You know how much I owe to Father Malcolm,' she softly added, as she led the maiden to a carved rood at the end of the cloister, and, before it, repeated the vernacular version of the Lord's Prayer till Eleanor knew it perfectly, and promised to follow up her 'Pater Nosters' with it.
And from that time there certainly was a different tone and spirit in Eleanor.
David, urged by his father, who still publicly ignored the young Douglas, persuaded him to write to his father now that there could be no longer any danger of pursuit, and the messenger Sir Patrick was sending to the King would afford the last opportunity. George growled and groaned a good deal, but perhaps Father Romuald pressed the duty on him in confession, for in his great relief at his lady's going off unplighted from London, he consented to indite, in the chamber Father Romuald shared with two of the Cardinal's chaplains, in a crooked and crabbed calligraphy and language much more resembling Anglo- Saxon than modern English, a letter to the most high and mighty, the Yerl of Angus, 'these presents.'
But when he was entreated to assume his right position in the troop, he refused. 'Na, na, Davie,' he said, 'gin my father chooses to send me gear and following, 'tis all very weel, but 'tisna for the credit of Scotland nor of Angus that the Master should be ganging about like a land-louper, with a single laddie after him--still less that he should be beholden to the Drummonds.'
'Ye would win to the speech of the lassie,' suggested David, 'gin that be what ye want!'
'Na kenning me, she willna look at me. Wait till I do that which may gar her look at me,' said the chivalrous youth.
He was not entirely without means, for the links of a gold chain which he had brought from home went a good way in exchange, and though he had spoken of being at his own charges, he had found himself compelled to live as one of the train of the princesses, who were treated as the guests first of the Duke of York, then of the Cardinal, who had given Sir Patrick a sum sufficient to defray all possible expenses as far as Bourges, besides having arranged for those of the journey with Suffolk whose rank had been raised to that of a Marquis, in honour of his activity as proxy for the King.
CHAPTER 6
THE PRICE OF A GOOSE
'We would have all such offenders cut off, and we give express charge that, in the marches through the country, there be nothing compelled from the villages.' --King Henry V.
The Marquis of Suffolk's was a slow progress both in England and abroad, with many halts both on account of weather and of feasts and festivals. Cardinal Beaufort had hurried the party away from London partly in order to make the match with Margaret of Anjou irrevocable, partly for the sake of removing Eleanor of Scotland, the only maiden who had ever produced the slightest impression on the monastic-minded Henry of Windsor.
When once out of London there were, however, numerous halts on the road,--two or three days of entertainment at every castle, and then a long delay at Canterbury to give time for Suffolk's retainers, and all the heralds, pursuivants, and other adjuncts of pomp and splendour, to join them. They were the guests of Archbishop Stafford, one of the peace party, and a friend of Beaufort and Suffolk, so that their entertainment was costly and magnificent, as befitted the mediaeval notions of a high-born gentleman, Primate of all England. A great