ing that should be thinking of
spears and jacks, lances and honours. Ye're welcome to him, Elleen, sin
ye choose to busk your cockernnonny at ane that's as good as wedded!
I'll never have the man who's wanting the strick of carle hemp in the
making of him!'

Eleanor burst into tears and pleaded that she was incapable of any such
intentions towards a man who was truly as good as married. She declared
that she had only replied as courtesy required, and that she would
not have her harp taken to Warwick House the next day, as she had been
requested to do.

Dame Lilias here interposed. With a certain conviction that Jean's
dislike to the King was chiefly because the grapes were sour, she
declared that Lady Elleen had by no means gone beyond the demeanour of
a douce maiden, and that the King had only shown due attention to guests
of his own rank, and who were nearly of his own age. In fact, she said,
it might be his caution and loyalty to his espoused lady that made him
avoid distinguishing the fairest.

It was not complimentary to Eleanor, but Jean's superior beauty was
as much an established fact as her age, and she was pacified in some
degree, agreeing with the Lady of Glenuskie that Eleanor was bound to
take her harp the next day.

Warwick House was a really magnificent place, its courts, gardens,
and offices covering much of the ground that still bears the name in the
City, and though the establishment was not quite as extensive as it
became a few years later, when Richard Nevil had succeeded his
brother-in-law, it was already on a magnificent scale.

All the party who had travelled together from Fotheringay were present,
besides the King, young Edmund and Jasper Tudor, and the Earl and
Countess of Suffolk; and the banquet, though not a state one, nor
encumbered with pageants and subtilties, was even more refined and
elegant than that at Westminster, showing, as all agreed, the hand of a
mistress of the household. The King's taste had been consulted, for in
the gallery were the children of St. Paul's choir and of the chapel of
the household, who sang hymns with sweet trained voices. Afterwards, on
the beautiful October afternoon, there was walking in the garden, where
Edmund and Jasper played with little Lady Anne Beauchamp, and again King
Henry sought out Eleanor, and they had an enjoyable discussion of the
Tale of Troie, which he had lent her, as they walked along the garden
paths. Then she showed him her cousin