es were thronging on hoard to
accompany him homewards, Gaston and Raymond sought him to petition for
leave to remain yet longer in France, that they might revisit the home
of their youth and the kind-hearted people who had protected them during
their helpless childhood.

Leave was promptly and willingly given, though the Prince was graciously
pleased to express a hope that he should see his faithful comrades in
England again ere long.

It had begun to be whispered abroad that these two lads with their
knightly bearing, their refinement of aspect, and their fearlessness in
the field, were no common youths sprung from some lowly stock. That
there was some mystery surrounding their birth was now pretty well
admitted, and this very mystery encircled them with something of a charm
-- a charm decidedly intensified by the aspect of Raymond, who never
looked so much the creature of flesh and blood as did his brother and
the other young warriors of Edward's camp. The fact, which was well
known now, that he had walked unharmed and unchallenged through the
streets of Calais upon the day of its capitulation, but before the terms
had been agreed upon, was in itself, in the eyes of many, a proof of
some strange power not of this world which encircled the youth. And
indeed Gaston himself was secretly of the opinion that his brother was
something of a saint or spirit, and regarded him with a reverential
affection unusual between brothers of the same age.

Through the four years since he had left his childhood's home, Gaston
had felt small wish to revisit it. The excitement and exaltation of the
new life had been enough for him, and the calm quiet of the peaceful
past had lost, its charm. Now, however, that the war was for the present
over, and with it the daily round of adventure and change; now that he
had gold in his purse, a fine charger to ride, and two or three stout
men-at-arms in his train, a sudden wish to see again the familiar haunts
of his childhood had come over him, and he had willingly agreed to
Raymond's suggestion that they should go together to Sauveterre, to ask
a blessing from Father Anselm, and tell him how they had fared since
they had parted from him long ago. True, Raymond had seen him a year
before, but he had not then been in battle; he had not had much to tell
save of the cloister life he had been sharing; and of Gaston's fortunes
he had himself known nothing.

Both brothers were for the present amply prov