ns was peremptory."

"I trust your honour will prevail," said Mrs. Woodford gently. "You
have effected a mighty change in the poor boy, and I can well
believe that he is as a son to you."

"Well, madam, yes--as sons go," said the knight in a somewhat
disappointing tone.

She looked at him anxiously, and ventured to murmur a hope so very
like an inquiry, and so full of solicitous hope, that it actually
unlocked the envoy's reserve, and he said, "Ah, madam, you have been
the best mother that the poor youth has ever had! I will speak
freely to you, for should I fail in overcoming my brother's
prejudices, you will be able to do more for him than any one else,
and I know you will be absolutely secret."

Mrs. Woodford sighed, with forebodings of not long being able to aid
any one in this world, but still she listened with earnest interest
and sympathy.

"Yes, madam, you implanted in him that which yet may conquer his
strange nature. Your name is as it were a charm to conjure up his
better spirit."

"Of course," she said, "I never durst hope, that he could be tamed
and under control all at once, but--" and she paused.

"He has improved--vastly improved," said the uncle. "Indeed, when
first I took him with me, while he was still weak, and moreover much
overcome by sea-sickness, while all was strange to him, and he was
relieved by not finding himself treated as an outcast, I verily
thought him meeker than other urchins, and that the outcry against
him was unmerited. But no sooner had we got to Berlin, and while I
was as yet too busy to provide either masters or occupations for my
young gentleman, than he did indeed make me feel that I had charge
of a young imp, and that if I did not watch the better, it might be
a case of war with his Spanish Majesty. For would you believe it,
his envoy's gardens joined ours, and what must my young master do,
but sit atop of our wall, making grimaces at the dons and donnas as
they paced the walks, and pelting them from time to time with
walnuts. Well, I was mindful of your counsel, and did not flog him,
nor let my chaplain do so, though I know the good man's fingers
itched to be at him; but I reasoned with him on the harm he was
doing me, and would you believe it, the poor lad burst into tears,
and implored me to give him something to do, to save him from his
own spirit. I set him to write out and translate a long roll of
Latin despatches sent up by that pedant Court in Hungary