The boy has been grossly maltreated," he said. "It is no mere
paternal chastisement he has received this day, but such a flogging
as none but the lowest vagabond would receive at the hands of the
law. The very bone is in one place laid bare, and there be many
traces of savage handling before this. Were he not mine own uncle,
bearing mine own name, I would not let so gross an outrage pass.
But at least we can do this much--shelter the lad and send him
forth, when he is fit for the saddle, in such sort that he may
reach London in easy fashion, as becomes one of his race. The lad
has brains and many excellent qualities. There is no reason why he
should not make his way in life."

"If he can be cured of his Papist beliefs," said Lady Frances; "but
no man holding them gets on in these days, and Cuthbert has been
bred up in the very worst of such tenets."

"So bad that he is half disgusted with them before he can rightly
say why," answered Sir Richard with a smile. "There is too much
hatred and bitterness in Nicholas Trevlyn's religion to endear it
to his children. The boy has had the wit to see that the
Established Church of the land uses the same creeds and holds the
same cardinal doctrines as he has been bred up in. For the Pope he
cares no whit; his British blood causes him to think scorn of any
foreign potentate, temporal or spiritual. He has the making of a
good churchman in him. He only wants training and teaching.
Methinks it were no bad thing to send him to his mother's kindred
for that. They are as stanch to the one party as old Nicholas to
the other. The lad will learn all he needs there of argument and
controversy, and will be able to weigh the new notions against the
old.

"Verily, the more I think of it the better I like the plan. He is
scarce fit for a battle with the world on his own account. Food and
shelter and a home of some sort will be welcome to him whilst he
tries the strength of his wings and fits them for a wider flight."

"His mother's kindred," repeated Kate quickly, and with a shade of
hauteur in her manner. "Why, father, I have ever thought that on
their mother's side our cousins had little cause to be proud of
their parentage. Was not their mother--"

"The daughter of a wool stapler, one Martin Holt, foster brother to
my venerated father, the third Earl of Andover," said Lady Frances,
quietly. "Truly, my daughter, these good folks are not in birth our
equal, and would be the first to say s