He could only insist that the requiem should be the first occasion of
the young ladies going out of the convent; but they had so many visitors
there that they had not much cause for murmuring, and the French
instructions of Sister Beata did not amount to much, even with Eleanor,
while Jean loudly protested that she was not going to school.

The great day of the requiem came at last. The Cardinal had, through
Sir Patrick Drummond and the Lady, provided handsome robes of black and
purple for his nieces, and likewise palfreys for their conveyance to
Westminster; and made it understood that unless Lady Joanna submitted to
be completely veiled he should send a closed litter.

'The doited auld carle!' she cried, as she unwillingly hooded and veiled
herself. 'One would think we were basilisks to slay the good folk of
London with our eyes.'

The Drummond following, with fresh thyme sprays, beginning to turn
brown, were drawn up in the outer court, all with black scarves across
the breast--George Douglas among them, of course--and they presently
united with the long train of clerks who belonged to the household of
the Cardinal of Winchester. Jean managed her veil so as to get more than
one peep at the throng in the streets through which they passed, so as
to see and to be seen; and she was disappointed that no acclamations
greeted the fair face thus displayed by fits. She did not understand
English politics enough to know that a Beaufort face and Beaufort train
were the last things the London crowd was likely to applaud. They had
not forgotten the penance of the popular Duke Humfrey's wife, which,
justly or unjustly, was imputed to the Cardinal and his nephews of
Somerset.

But the King, in robes of purple and black, came to assist her from her
palfrey before the beautiful entry of the Abbey Church, and led her up
the nave to the desks prepared around what was then termed 'a herce,'
but which would now be called a catafalque, an erection supposed to
contain the body, and adorned with the lozenges of the arms of Scotland
and Beaufort, and of the Stewart, in honour of the Black Knight of Lorn.

The Cardinal was present, but the Abbot of Westminster celebrated. All
was exceedingly solemn and beautiful, in a far different style from the
maimed rites that had been bestowed upon poor Queen Joanna in Scotland.
The young King's face was more angelic than ever, and as psalm and
supplication, dirge and hymn arose, chanted by the ful