ue, and over-due,
having come to Woolwich only for my sake, and yours, as it hath proved.
Then at Calais I have intelligence that we shall find a ship bound for
Hull, by which we may go thither, and so home to our father in the
Dales.'

'Do you know,' I said, 'I suspected your design to be for Holland?'

'Well,' said he, 'I had such a thought for Andrew. There be friends in
that country, with whom he might be sheltered till England should be
safe for him once more. But it dislikes me to have dealings with any
country at war with mine own--mad and wicked though the war be on our
part.'

'All England is gone mad and wicked, I think,' said Althea; 'for my
share I care not much if I never see it more.'

'You will change that thought, I hope,' said he. 'But now, my Lucy, I
have a request and a petition to you. Captain Maret will bring us at
Calais to a clergyman of the English Church whom he knows there; will
you consent for the good man to join our hands? 'tis long since our
hearts were knit, I trow.'

'What are you asking of her?' said Althea; 'should not such a marriage
be celebrated on English ground?'

'So it shall,' said he; 'for we will be wedded on board the ship that
shall take us to Hull; and her planks, being those of an English vessel,
are reckoned English ground. Now, what says my dear heart?' and as I
blushed and stammered, 'I warrant you,' said he, 'Lucy is struck dumb at
my presumption in talking of wedlock, my good ship being gone to wreck,
and I myself newly loosed from slavery.'

'Harry!' I cried, 'how dare you think so meanly of me? I who have been
delighting in the thought of pouring all my little wealth at your feet,
and bidding you freight a new ship with it; but perhaps you are too
proud--you will refuse it?'

'Nay, I refuse neither it nor thee, my Lucy,' he said, 'the less because
I can counterpoise my darling's little purse with something weightier.'
And he told us briefly how in his captivity he had risen very high in
his Moorish master's favour, having had the good fortune to save the
man's life at the risk of his own.

'There were two rascals set on my master to murder him, for certain
precious jewels that he wore,' said he; 'and I had the luck to lay them
both low, though I got this little remembrance first from the fiercest
of them,' touching as he spoke the scar upon his cheek. 'And with that
stroke,' he went on, 'I purchased my freedom, and something more; for
the Moor conferred o