ent my young
son to you, who under Heaven hath been the means of saving many lives
this day.'

Maitre Isaac Gardon, a noted preacher, looked kindly at the boy's fair
face, and said, 'Bless thee, young sir. As thou hast been already a
chosen instrument to save life, so mayest thou be ever after a champion
of the truth.'

'Monsieur le Baron,' interposed Jacques, 'it were best to look to
yourself. I already hear sounds upon the wind.'

'And you, good sir?' said the Baron.

'I will see to him,' said the farmer, grasping him as a sort of
property. 'M. le Baron had best keep up the beck. Out on the moor there
he may fly the hawk, and that will best divert suspicion.'

'Farewell, then,' said the Baron, wringing the minister's hand, and
adding, almost to himself, 'Alas! I am weary of these shifts!' and weary
indeed he seemed, for as the ground became so steep that the beck danced
noisily down its channel, he could not keep up the needful speed, but
paused, gasping for breath, with his hand on his side. 'Beranger was off
his pony in an instant, assuring Follet that it ought to be proud to be
ridden by his father, and exhaling his own exultant feelings in caresses
to the animal as it gallantly breasted the hill. The little boy had
never been so commended before! He loved his father exceedingly; but
the Baron, while ever just towards him, was grave and strict to a degree
that the ideas even of the sixteenth century regarded as severe.
Little Eustacie with her lovely face, her irrepressible saucy grace and
audacious coaxing, was the only creature to whom he ever showed much
indulgence and tenderness, and even that seemed almost against his
will and conscience. His son was always under rule, often blamed,
and scarcely ever praised; but it was a hardy vigorous nature, and
respectful love throve under the system that would have crushed or
alienated a different disposition. It was not till the party had emerged
from the wood upon a stubble field, where a covey of partridges flew up,
and to Beranger's rapturous delight furnished a victim for Ysonde, that
M. de Ribaumont dismounted from the pony, and walking towards home,
called his son to his side, and asked him how he had learnt the
intentions of the Count and the Chevalier. Beranger explained how
Eustacie had come to warn him, and also told what she had said of Diane
de Ribaumont, who had lately, by her father's request, spent a few weeks
at the chateau with her cousins.

'My