nough, too,
to have so fine a bird in their cage for a week or two."

"And my mother?"

"We'll send to her to-morrow by daybreak. Come, a stirrup cup to start
with, hot and hot. Now, boots, cloaks, swords, a deep pull and a warm
one, and away!"

And the jolly old man bustled them out of the house and into their
saddles, under the broad bright winter's moon.

"You must make your pace, lads, or the moon will be down before you are
over the moors." And so away they went.

Neither of them spoke for many a mile. Amyas, because his mind was fixed
firmly on the one object of saving the honor of his house; and Will,
because he was hesitating between Ireland and the wars, and Rose
Salterne and love-making. At last he spoke suddenly.

"I'll go, Amyas."

"Whither?"

"To Ireland with you, old man. I have dragged my anchor at last."

"What anchor, my lad of parables?"

"See, here am I, a tall and gallant ship."

"Modest even if not true."

"Inclination, like an anchor, holds me tight."

"To the mud."

"Nay, to a bed of roses--not without their thorns."

"Hillo! I have seen oysters grow on fruit-trees before now, but never an
anchor in a rose-garden."

"Silence, or my allegory will go to noggin-staves."

"Against the rocks of my flinty discernment."

"Pooh--well. Up comes duty like a jolly breeze, blowing dead from the
northeast, and as bitter and cross as a northeaster too, and tugs
me away toward Ireland. I hold on by the rosebed--any ground in a
storm--till every strand is parted, and off I go, westward ho! to get my
throat cut in a bog-hole with Amyas Leigh."

"Earnest, Will?"

"As I am a sinful man."

"Well done, young hawk of the White Cliff!"

"I had rather have called it Gallantry Bower still, though," said
Will, punning on the double name of the noble precipice which forms the
highest point of the deer park.

"Well, as long as you are on land, you know it is Gallantry Bower still:
but we always call it White Cliff when you see it from the sea-board, as
you and I shall do, I hope, to-morrow evening."

"What, so soon?"

"Dare we lose a day?"

"I suppose not: heigh-ho!"

And they rode on again in silence, Amyas in the meanwhile being not a
little content (in spite of his late self-renunciation) to find that one
of his rivals at least was going to raise the siege of the Rose garden
for a few months, and withdraw his forces to the coast of Kerry.

As they went over Bursdon, Amyas pulled up s