help mightily,' Hal laughed. 'But you were at your lessons this
morn, Jack Scholar.'

'Oh, pirates aren't lessons. It was only Bruce and his silly old
spider,' said Una. 'Why did Sir Andrew Barton help you?' 'I question
if he ever knew it,' said Hal, twinkling. 'Robin, how a' mischief's
name am I to tell these innocents what comes of sinful pride?'

'Oh, we know all about that,' said Una pertly. 'If you get too
beany--that's cheeky--you get sat upon, of course.'

Hal considered a moment, pen in air, and Puck said some long words.

'Aha! that was my case too,' he cried. 'Beany--you say--but certainly
I did not conduct myself well. I was proud of--of such things as
porches--a Galilee porch at Lincoln for choice--proud of one
Torrigiano's arm on my shoulder, proud of my knighthood when I made the
gilt scroll-work for the Sovereign--our King's ship. But Father Roger
sitting in Merton College Library, he did not forget me. At the top of
my pride, when I and no other should have builded the porch at Lincoln,
he laid it on me with a terrible forefinger to go back to my Sussex
clays and rebuild, at my own charges, my own church, where us Dawes
have been buried for six generations. "Out! Son of my Art!" said he.
"Fight the Devil at home ere you call yourself a man and a craftsman."
And I quaked, and I went... How's yon, Robin?' He flourished the
finished sketch before Puck.

'Me! Me past peradventure,' said Puck, smirking like a man at a
mirror. 'Ah, see! The rain has took off! I hate housen in daylight.'

'Whoop! Holiday!' cried Hal, leaping up. 'Who's for my Little
Lindens? We can talk there.'

They tumbled downstairs, and turned past the dripping willows by the
sunny mill-dam.

'Body o' me,' said Hal, staring at the hop-garden, where the hops were
just ready to blossom. 'What are these? Vines? No, not vines, and
they twine the wrong way to beans.' He began to draw in his ready book.

'Hops. New since your day,' said Puck. 'They're an herb of Mars, and
their flowers dried flavour ale. We say--

'Turkeys, Heresy, Hops, and Beer
Came into England all in one year.'

'Heresy I know. I've seen Hops--God be praised for their beauty! What
is your Turkis?'

The children laughed. They knew the Lindens turkeys, and as soon as
they reached Lindens orchard on the hill the full flock charged at them.

Out came Hal's book at once. 'Hoity-toity!' he cried. 'Here's Pride in
purple feat