squires of the court, all
jostling and pushing in an ever-changing, many-colored stream, while
English, French, Welsh, Basque, and the varied dialects of Gascony and
Guienne filled the air with their babel. From time to time the throng
would be burst asunder and a lady's horse-litter would trot past tow
torch-bearing archers walking in front of Gascon baron or English
knight, as he sought his lodgings after the palace revels. Clatter of
hoofs, clinking of weapons, shouts from the drunken brawlers, and high
laughter of women, they all rose up, like the mist from a marsh, out of
the crowded streets of the dim-lit city.

One couple out of the moving throng especially engaged the attention
of the two young squires, the more so as they were going in their own
direction and immediately in front of them. They consisted of a man and
a girl, the former very tall with rounded shoulders, a limp of one
foot, and a large flat object covered with dark cloth under his arm.
His companion was young and straight, with a quick, elastic step and
graceful bearing, though so swathed in a black mantle that little could
be seen of her face save a flash of dark eyes and a curve of raven hair.
The tall man leaned heavily upon her to take the weight off his tender
foot, while he held his burden betwixt himself and the wall, cuddling it
jealously to his side, and thrusting forward his young companion to act
as a buttress whenever the pressure of the crowd threatened to bear him
away. The evident anxiety of the man, the appearance of his attendant,
and the joint care with which they defended their concealed possession,
excited the interest of the two young Englishmen who walked within
hand-touch of them.

"Courage, child!" they heard the tall man exclaim in strange hybrid
French. "If we can win another sixty paces we are safe."

"Hold it safe, father," the other answered, in the same soft, mincing
dialect. "We have no cause for fear."

"Verily, they are heathens and barbarians," cried the man; "mad,
howling, drunken barbarians! Forty more paces, Tita mia, and I swear to
the holy Eloi, patron of all learned craftsmen, that I will never set
foot over my door again until the whole swarm are safely hived in their
camp of Dax, or wherever else they curse with their presence. Twenty
more paces, my treasure: Ah, my God! how they push and brawl! Get
in their way, Tita mia! Put your little elbow bravely out! Set your
shoulders squarely against them, gi