me where I
can make use of this, which my good Lord of St. Andrews gave me.'

'What is it, Patie? Not the red gold?'

'Oh no! I have heard of the like. Ye ken Morini, as they call him, the
Lombard goldsmith in the Canongate? Weel, for sums that the Bishop will
pay to Morini, sums owing, he says, by himself to the Crown--though
I shrewdly suspect 'tis the other way, gude man!--then the Lombard's
fellows in York, London, or Paris, or Bourges will, on seeing this bit
bond, supply us up to the tune of a hundred crowns. Thou look'st mazed,
Lily, but I have known the like before. 'Tis no great sum, but mayhap
the maidens' English kin will do somewhat for them before they win to
their sister.'

'I would not have them beholden to the English,' said Dame Lilias, not
forgetting that she was a Stewart.

Her husband perhaps scarcely understood the change made in the whole
aspect of the journey to her. Not only had she to hurry her preparations
for the early start, but instead of travelling as the mistress of the
party, she and her daughter would, in appearance at least, be the mere
appendages of the two princesses, wait upon them, give them the foremost
place, supply their present needs from what was provided for themselves,
and it was quite possible have likewise to control girlish petulance and
inexperience in the strange lands where her charges must appear at their
very best, to do honour to their birth and their country.

But the loyal woman made up her mind without a word of complaint after
the first shock, and though a busy night was not the best preparation
for a day's journey, she never lay down; nor indeed did her namesake
daughter, who was to be left at a Priory on their way, there to decide
whether she had a vocation to be a nun.

So effectually did she bestir herself that by six o'clock the next
morning the various packages were rolled up for bestowal on the sumpter
horses, and the goods to be left at home locked up in chests, and
committed to the charge of the trusty seneschal and his wife; a meal, to
be taken in haste, was spread on the table in the hall, to be swallowed
while the little rough ponies were being laden.

Mass was to be heard at the first halting-place, the Benedictine nunnery
of Trefontana on Lammermuir, where Lilias Drummond was to be left, to be
passed on, when occasion served, to the Sisterhood at Edinburgh.

The fresh morning breezes over the world of heather brightened the
cheeks and the s