Here we sat and talked until the breakfast-bell rang, and we went into
the dining-room. I was as hungry as a trooper by this time, after my
all-night experience on the Chester.

The dining-room was a long room, with open windows looking out across
the river and the fields.

We had not as yet taken our seats, when through another door came
Mistress Jean and Mistress Nancy Nicholson, her bosom friend and
confidante, with their arms around each other's waists--a charming
picture.

The colour mantled high on Mistress Jean's cheek, and I am sure that
mine played the traitor also, but Mistress Nancy came to the rescue by
demanding news and particulars of her cavalier, for such she declared
Mr. Richard Ringgold of Hunting Field to be.

Answering, I told her that I had left him covered with blood and with
glory, but on the fair road to recovery. And so, though Mistress Jean
still showed a heightened colour, in telling of Master Richard's
fortunes and escapes we broke the embarrassment of the meeting, and
were soon fast friends again. It was a merry breakfast. Afterward the
two young ladies and I walked in the garden by the river's edge and
talked of many things,--of war and campaigning, for I claimed to be an
authority by now, and quite a veteran,--of love; but that was too
dangerous, for Mistress Nancy would look at me slyly and laugh as she
asked if I was as great an authority upon the one as I was upon the
other.

I retorted that I had heard many a lecture on the subject from Master
Richard, but otherwise knew nothing of the art, and then I begged her
to take me as a pupil, so that in time I might become as great a
scholar as Dick himself. But she roguishly recommended me to her
Assistant Professor Mistress Jean Gordon, who, she told me, knew more
of the art than she did herself. And then, having come to some boxwood
alleys, she slipped away and left Mistress Jean and me alone.

"They tell me, Mistress Jean, that love is war; may I ask what the
fate of the prisoners is?"

"As in real war," she replied, "those who surrender at discretion
receive but scant courtesy, but those who make a gallant resistance
are often victorious in their defeat."

"I see that you love the old Highland fashion, where the bridegroom
came with force and arms and bore the bride away."

"Better swords and daggers, and hearts that are true, than silks and
satins, Lowland fops and perfidy."

"English swords have crossed ere this with Hi