The White Rose of Langley. Emily Sarah Holt

to visit the Lady Custance, and Dame Margaret his sister.”

      Maude lifted her eyes to the height of Alvena, and found that she had to lower them to her own. A young lady of about sixteen entered, dressed in a rose-coloured silk striped with gold, and a gold-coloured mantle lined with the palest blue. She led by the hand a very pretty little boy of ten or eleven years of age, attired in a velvet tunic of that light, bright shade of apple-green which our forefathers largely used. It was edged at the neck by a little white frill. He carried in his hand a black velvet cap, from which depended a long and very full red plume of ostrich feathers. His stockings were white silk, his boots red leather, fastened with white buttons. The brother and sister were alike, but the small, delicately-cut features of both were the more delicate in the boy, and on his dark brown hair was a golden gloss which was not visible on that of his sister.

      “Give you good morrow, Mistress Alvena,” said Dame Margaret pleasantly. “The Lady Custance—may one have speech of her?”

      Before Alvena could reply, the curtain which shrouded the door leading to the Countess’s rooms was drawn aside, and Constance came forward herself.

      “Good morrow, Meg,” said she, kissing the young lady. “Thou hast mistaken thy road, Tom.”

      “Wherefore so?” asked Dame Margaret; for her little brother was silent, except that he offered a kiss in his turn, and looked rather disconcerted when no notice was taken of it.

      “Why, Ned is playing quoits below, and Tom should have bidden with him. Come hither, Meg; I have a pretty thing to show thee.”

      “But Tom came to see your Ladyship.”

      “Well, he has seen me!” said the little Princess impatiently. “I love not lads. They are fit for nought better than playing quoits. Let them go and do it.”

      “What, Dickon?” said Margaret, smiling.

      “Oh, Dickon!” returned Constance in a changed tone. “But Tom is not Dickon. Neither is he an angel, I wis, for I heard him gainsay once his preceptor.”

      Tom looked very unhappy at this raking up of bygone misdeeds.

      “Methinks your Ladyship is in ill humour this morrow,” said Margaret. “Be not so hard on the lad, for he loveth you.”

      “When I love him, I will do him to wit,” said Constance cuttingly. “Come, Meg.”

      Dame Margaret obeyed the command, but she kept hold of the hand of her little brother. When they were gone, Alvena laid down her work and laughed.

      “Thy Queen of Faery is passing gracious, Maude.”

      “She scarce seemed to matter the lad,” was Maude’s reply.

      “Yet she hath sworn to do his bidding all the days of her life,” said Alvena.

      “Why,” said Maude, looking up in surprise, “would you say the Lady Custance is troth-plight unto this imp?” (Little boy.)

      “Nay, she is wedded wife. ’Tis five years or more sithence they were wed. My Lady Custance had years four, and my Lord Le Despenser five. They could but just syllable their vows. And I mind me, the Lady Custance stuck at ‘obey,’ and she had to be threatened with a fustigation (beating, whipping) ere she would go on.”

      “But who dared threaten her?” inquired Maude.

      “Marry, my Lord her father, which fell into a fit of ire to see her perversity.—There goeth the dinner bell; lap thy work, child. For me, I am well fain to hear it.”

      Note 1. The child was Constance, only daughter of Edmund Duke of York (seventh son of Edward the Third) and Isabel of Castilla.

      Note 2. Agnes de La Marche had been the nurse of two of Edward the Third’s sons, Lionel and Edmund. She lived to old age, and was long in receipt of a pension from the Crown for her former service.

      Note 3. Wycliffe’s rendering of Revelations sixteen 6. In various places he follows what are now determined to be the best and most ancient authorities.

Chapter Three.

       Table of Contents

      Strange Tales.

      “Oh stay me not, thou holy friar!

       Oh stay me not, I pray!

       No drizzling rain that falls on me

       Can wash my fault away.”—Bishop Percy.

      On entering the banquet-hall of Langley Palace, Maude the tire-maiden found herself promoted to a very different position from that which had been filled by Maude the scullion. Her former place had been near the door, and far below that important salt-cellar which was then the table-indicator of rank. She was directed now to take her seat as the lowest of the Countess’s maidens, on a form just opposite the salt-cellar, which was more than half-way up the hall. Maude had hardly sat down when her next neighbour below accosted her in a familiar voice.

      “Why, little Maude! I looked for thee in vain at yon board end, and I was but now marvelling what had befallen thee. How earnest up hither?” Maude smiled back at Bertram Lyngern.

      “It pleased the Lady’s Grace to make me of her especial following.”

      “Long life to the Lady!—Now will I cause thee to wit who be all my friends. This on my left hand is Master Hugh Calverley, Mistress Maude (for thou art now of good degree, and must be spoken unto belike); he is mine especial friend, and a very knight-errant in succour of all unceli (distressed, unhappy) damsels.”

      “And who is he that is next unto the Lady Custance?”

      “On her right hand, the Lord Edward, and the Lord Richard at her left—her brethren both.”

      Lord Richard pleased Maude. He was a winning little fellow of eight years old. But Edward she disliked instinctively:—a tall, handsome boy of twelve, but completely spoiled by the supercilious curl of his lip and the proud carriage of his head.

      “And the Lord Earl?” she whispered to Bertram, who pointed out his royal master.

      He was very tall, and extremely slender; not exactly ungraceful, but he gave the impression that his arms and legs were perpetually in his way. In fact, he was a nervous man, always self-conscious, and therefore never natural nor at ease. His hair was dark auburn; and in his lower lip there was a tremulous fulness which denoted at once great good-nature and great indecision.

      It is a singular fact that the four English Princes who have borne the name of Edmund have all shared this character, of mingled gentleness and weakness; but in each the weakness was more and the amiability less, until the dual character terminated in this last of our royal Edmunds. He was the obedient servant of any person who chose to take the trouble to be his master. And there was one person who found it worth his while to take that trouble. This individual—the Earl’s youngest brother—will come across our path presently.

      The dinner to-day was more elaborate than usual, for there were several guests present. Since the host was a Prince, the birds presented were served whole; had both he and his guests been commoners, they would have been “chopped on gobbets.” More interesting than any fictitious delineation on my part will be a genuine menu of the period, “The purveyance made for King Richard, being with the Duke of Lancaster at the Bishop’s Palace of Durham at London,” of course accompanied by their suites. That the suites were of no small size we gather from the provision made. It consisted of “14 oxen lying in salt, 2 oxen fresh, 120 heads of sheep fresh, 120 carcases of sheep fresh, 12 boars, 14 calves, 140 pigs; 300 marrow-bones, of lard and grease enough, 3 tons of salt venison, 3 does of fresh venison. The poultry:—50 swans, 210 geese, 50 capons of grease (fat capons), 8 dozen other capons, 60 dozen hens, 200 couple conies (rabbits), 4 pheasants, 5 herons and bitterns, 6 kids,