gentle and
honorable debate over the question."

For a moment a dozen challenges flashed backwards and forwards at this
sudden bursting of the cloud which had lowered so long between the
knights of the two nations. Furious and gesticulating the Gascons, white
and cold and sneering the English, while the prince with a half smile
glanced from one party to the other, like a man who loved to dwell upon
a fiery scene, and yet dreaded least the mischief go so far that he
might find it beyond his control.

"Friends, friends!" he cried at last, "this quarrel must go no further.
The man shall answer to me, be he Gascon or English, who carries it
beyond this room. I have overmuch need for your swords that you should
turn them upon each other. Sir John Charnell, Lord Audley, you do not
doubt the courage of our friends of Gascony?"

"Not I, sire," Lord Audley answered. "I have seen them fight too often
not to know that they are very hardy and valiant gentlemen."

"And so say I," quoth the other Englishman; "but, certes, there is no
fear of our forgetting it while they have a tongue in their heads."

"Nay, Sir John," said the prince reprovingly, "all peoples have their
own use and customs. There are some who might call us cold and dull and
silent. But you hear, my lords of Gascony, that these gentlemen had no
thought to throw a slur upon your honor or your valor, so let all anger
fade from your mind. Clisson, Captal, De Pommers, I have your word?"

"We are your subjects, sire," said the Gascon barons, though with no
very good grace. "Your words are our law."

"Then shall we bury all cause of unkindness in a flagon of Malvoisie,"
said the prince, cheerily. "Ho, there! the doors of the banquet-hall!
I have been over long from my sweet spouse but I shall be back with you
anon. Let the sewers serve and the minstrels play, while we drain a
cup to the brave days that are before us in the south!" He turned away,
accompanied by the two monarchs, while the rest of the company, with
many a compressed lip and menacing eye, filed slowly through the
side-door to the great chamber in which the royal tables were set forth.

CHAPTER XX. HOW ALLEYNE WON HIS PLACE IN AN HONORABLE GUILD.

Whilst the prince's council was sitting, Alleyne and Ford had remained
in the outer hall, where they were soon surrounded by a noisy group of
young Englishmen of their own rank, all eager to hear the latest news
from England.

"How is it with the ol