, who is married to one of the Armstrongs,
near Jedburgh. If your lordship will deign to employ me in such
service, I can promise to do so safely, and to justify my uncle's
recommendation; and shall be ready, at all times, to risk my life in
carrying out your orders."

"Well spoken, lad. I like the tone of your voice, and your manner of
speech. They are such as will do no discredit to my household, and I
hereby appoint you to it; further matters I will discuss with your
uncle."

Oswald expressed his thanks in suitable terms, and then, bowing deeply,
retired.

"A very proper lad, Alwyn. I would have done much for you, old friend,
and would have taken him in some capacity, whatever he might have
turned out; but, frankly, I doubted whether John Forster, valiant moss
trooper as he is, would have been like to have had a son whom I could
enroll in my household, where the pages and esquires are all sons of
knights and men of quality. It is true that his father might have been
a knight, had he chosen, since the earl offered him that honour after
Otterburn; for three times he charged, at the head of a handful of his
own men, right into the heart of the Scottish army, to try and rescue
me; but he has always kept aloof in his own hold, going his own way and
fighting for his own hand; and never once, that I can recall, has he
paid a visit to us here, or at our other seats. I feared that under
such a training as he would be likely to have, the lad would have been
but a rough diamond. However, from his appearance and bearing, he might
well have come of a noble family."

"'Tis his mother's doing, methinks, Sir Henry. She is of gentle birth.
Her father was Sir Walter Gillespie. He was killed by the Scots, when
she was but a girl, or methinks he would scarcely have given her in
marriage to my brother John. She went with a sister to live with an old
aunt, who let the girls have their way, without murmur; and seeing that
they had no dowry, for their father was but a poor knight, there were
not many claimants for their hands; and when she chose John Forster,
and her sister Adam Armstrong, she did not say them nay. She has made a
good wife to him, though she must have had many an anxious hour, and
doubtless it is her influence that has made the lad what he is."

"How think you I had best bestow him, among the pages or the esquires?"

"I should say, Sir Henry, as you are good enough to ask my opinion,
that it were best among the esqui