l overhead took up the time, the gittern struck a few sharp
notes. This unexpected music stopped the noise, and all was still. Nick
thought of his mother's voice singing on a summer's evening among the
hollyhocks, and as the viol's droning died away he drew a deep breath
and began to sing the words of "Heywood's newest song":

"Pack, clouds, away, and welcome, day;
With night we banish sorrow;
Sweet air, blow soft; mount, lark, aloft,
To give my love good-morrow!"

It was only a part of a madrigal, the air to which they had fitted the
words,--the same air that Nick had sung in the woods,--a thing scarce
meant ever to be sung alone, a simple strain, a few plain notes, and at
the close one brief, queer, warbling trill like a bird's wild song, that
rose and fell and rose again like a silver ripple.

The instruments were still; the fresh young voice came out alone, and it
was done so soon that Nick hardly knew that he had sung at all. For a
moment no one seemed to breathe. Then there was a very great noise, and
all the court seemed hurling at him. A man upon the stage sprang to his
feet. What they were going to do to him Nick did not know. He gave a
frightened cry, and ran past the green curtain, through the open door,
and into the master-player's excited arms.

"Quick, quick!" cried Carew. "Go back, go back! There, hark!--dost not
hear them call? Quick, out again--they call thee back!" With that he
thrust Nick through the door. The man upon the stage came up, slipped
something into his hand--Nick, all bewildered, knew not what; and there
he stood, quite stupefied, not knowing what to do. Then Carew came out
hastily and led him down the stage, bowing, and pressing his hand to his
heart, and smiling like a summer sunrise; so that Nick, seeing this, did
the same, and bowed as neatly as he could; though, to be sure, his was
only a simple, country-bred bow, and no such ceremonious to-do as Master
Carew's courtly London obeisance.

Every one was standing up and shouting so that not a soul could hear his
ears, until the ironmonger's apprentice bellowed above the rest; "Whoy,
bullies!" he shouted, amid a chorus of cheers and laughter, "didn't I
say 'twas catched out in the fields--it be a skylark, sure enough! Come,
Muster Skylark, sing that song again, an' thou shalt ha' my
brand-new cap!"

Then many voices cried out together, "Sing it again! The Skylark--the
Skylark!"

Nick looked up, startled. "