d the gleeman over the hills and
dales of a flowering dream-world.

For a space after he had finished, the silence remained unbroken, then
gave way only to an outburst of applause. And one did even better than
applaud. Bending forward, his beautiful face quite radiant with his
pleasure, the curly-headed page pulled a golden ring from his pouch and
tossed it into the harper's lap.

As he caught the largess, the man's mouth broadened. "I thank you for
your good-will, fair stripling," he returned. "May you find as true a
love when your time comes to go a-wooing."

The maids tittered, while the men guffawed, and a richer glow came
into the cheeks of Fridtjof the page. Suddenly his iris-blue eyes were
daringly a-sparkle.

"The spirits will have forgot your wish before that time comes," he
laughed, "for I vow that I will raise a beard or ever I woo a maiden."

Above the mirth that followed rose the voice of the brawniest of the
henchmen, passing his judgment on the ballad. "Now that is my own desire
of songs," he declared. "That was worth possessing,--the love of that
lass. A sweetheart who will cleave to your side when your fortune is
most severe, and despise every good because she has not you also, she
is the filly to yoke with. Drink to the wood maiden, comrades, bare feet
and wild ways and all!" Swinging up his horn, he drained off the toast
at a draught. "Give us a mistress like that, my lord," he cried merrily,
"and we will hold Ivarsdale for her though all of Edmund's men batter at
the doors."

Laughing, they all looked up where the young master leaned in his chair,
watching the revels with a smile of idle good-humor. All except the
blue-eyed page; he bent forward instead, so that his long locks fell
softly about his face.

The Lord of Ivarsdale shook his head indolently against the cushion. "No
wood lass for me, friend Celric," he said. "The lady of my love shall
be a high-born maid who knows no more of the world's roughness than I of
woman's ways. Nor shall she follow me at all, but stay modestly at
home with her maids and keep herself gentle and fair against my return.
Deliver me from your sun-browned, boy-bred wenches!"

"I am consenting to that, lord!" a voice cried from the benches; and
a hubbub of conflicting opinions arose. Only the page neither spoke or
moved.

The henchman would not be downed; again his voice rose above the others.
"In soft days, my lord, in soft days, it might easily be so. But be