r I think they
wear helmets, with visors lowered, and gorgets of the same.--A plague
upon these gorgets of all other pieces of armour!--I have fumbled with
them an hour before I could undo the rivets."

"Do you, gracious ladies," said Durward, without attending to Petit
Andre, "ride forward--not so fast as to raise an opinion of your being
in flight, and yet fast enough to avail yourself of the impediment which
I shall presently place between you and these men who follow us."

The Countess Isabelle looked to their guide, and then whispered to her
aunt, who spoke to Quentin thus: "We have confidence in your care, fair
Archer, and will rather abide the risk of whatever may chance in your
company, than we will go onward with that man, whose mien is, we think,
of no good augury."

"Be it as you will, ladies," said the youth. "There are but two who come
after us, and though they be knights, as their arms seem to show, they
shall, if they have any evil purpose, learn how a Scottish gentleman can
do his devour in the presence and for the defence of such as you.

"Which of you," he continued, addressing the guards whom he commanded,
"is willing to be my comrade, and to break a lance with these gallants?"

Two of the men obviously faltered in resolution, but the third, Bertrand
Guyot, swore that cap de diou, were they Knights of King Arthur's Round
Table, he would try their mettle, for the honour of Gascony.

While he spoke, the two knights--for they seemed of no less rank--came
up with the rear of the party, in which Quentin, with his sturdy
adherent, had by this time stationed himself. They were fully accoutred
in excellent armour of polished steel, without any device by which they
could be distinguished.

One of them, as they approached, called out to Quentin, "Sir Squire,
give place--we come to relieve you of a charge which is above your rank
and condition. You will do well to leave these ladies in our care, who
are fitter to wait upon them, especially as we know that in yours they
are little better than captives."

"In return to your demand, sirs," replied Durward, "know, in the first
place, that I am discharging the duty imposed upon me by my present
sovereign, and next, that however unworthy I may be, the ladies desire
to abide under my protection."

"Out, sirrah!" exclaimed one of the champions, "will you, a wandering
beggar, put yourself on terms of resistance against belted knights?"

"They are indeed terms