"Why, _Milly_, do but look at yon gentleman!" saith _Edith_, as he
passed by us, taking no note of us at all. "Is it not the same we met
on Saint _Hubert's_ Isle?"

"Is it so?" said I, making believe to look after him, the rather since
it gave me an excuse to turn my back on them. "He bears a green
jerkin,--otherwise--"

Wherein I am very sure I said _no_ falsity, as whatso _Father_ might
say.

"I do think it is the same," saith _Edith_. "Came he ever to speak with
you, _Father_?"

"Nay, my lass, I mind him not," saith _Father_.

"He is not ill-looking," saith _Mother_.

"May-be not," quoth _Father_. "Thou art a better judge of such matters
than I, dear heart. I only note the way a man's soul looketh out of his
eyes, not the colour of the eyes whence it looketh."

"Now, _Father_, under your good leave, that is not well said," _Edith_
makes answer: "for you have your own self the fairest eyes ever a man's
soul looked forth of."

_Father_ laughs at this, and doffs his cap merrily.

"Your very humble servant, Mistress _Editha Louvaine_," quoth he: "when
I do desire to send forth to the world a book of all my beauties,
learning, and virtues, I will bid you to write therein touching mine
eyes. They serve me well to see withal, I thank God, and beyond that
issue have I never troubled me regarding them."

"And how liked you the manner of Sir _Edwin Tregarvon's_ soul looking
forth, _Father_?" saith _Edith_, also laughing.

"Why, that could I not see," quoth he, "for he keeping his eyes bent
upon the ground, it did not look forth. But I cannot say his face
altogether pleased me."

How mighty strange is it that all they--and in especial _Father_, that I
have alway reckoned so wise--should have so little discernment!

Well, methought, as they were there, I must needs come home with them:
and this afternoon, if I can steal hence without any seeing me, will I
go yet again to the copse, to see if I may find my _Protection_: for I
have well-nigh granted the privy wedding he hath pled so hard for, and
this morrow we thought to order the inwards thereof [settle the
details]. As next _Sunday_ at even, saith he, I am to steal forth of
the garden door, and he shall meet me in the lane with an hackney and
two or three serving-men for guard: and so go we forth to _Ambleside_,
where the priest shall join our hands, and then come back and entreat
_Father_ and _Mother's_ pardon and blessing. I dare be bound there
sh