h his fair queen, and beautified it in every
way, specially adorning the chapel, but also strengthening the
defences, until men thought the castle impregnable.

Well they might, for our Martin and Hubert beheld on their arrival
a double row of ramparts, looking over a moat half a mile round,
and sometimes a quarter of that distance broad: and the old
servitors still told how the sad and feeble king had built a
fragile bark, with silken hangings and painted sides, wherein he
and his newly-married bride oft took the air on the moat. The
buildings of the castle were most extensive; the space within the
moat contained seven acres; the great hall could seat two hundred
guests. The park extended without a break from the walls of
Coventry on the northeast to the far borders of the park of the
great Earl of Warwick on the southwest--a distance of several
miles.

And here, in the society of a score of other boys of their own age,
our Hubert and Martin were to receive their early education as
pages.

Education--ah, how unlike that which falls to the lot of the
schoolboy of the nineteenth century. As a rule, the care of the
mother was deemed too tender and the paternal roof too indulgent
for a boy after his twelfth year, so he was sent, not exactly to a
boarding school, but to the castle of some eminent noble, such as
the one under our observation; and here, in the company of from ten
to twenty companions of his own age, he began his studies.

We have previously described this course of education in a former
tale, The Rival Heirs, but for the benefit of those who have not read
the afore-said story we must be pardoned a little recapitulation.

He was daily exercised in the use of all manner of weapons,
beginning with such as were of simple character; he was taught to
ride, not only in the saddle, but to sit a horse bare-backed, or
under any conceivable circumstances which might occur. He had to
bend the stout yew bow and to wield the sword, he had to couch the
lance, which art he acquired with dexterity by the practice at the
quintain.

He had also to do the work of a menial, but not in a menial spirit.
It was his to wait upon his lord at table, to be a graceful cup
bearer, a clever carver, able to select the titbits for the ladies,
and then to assign the other portions according to rank.

It was his to follow the hounds, to learn the blasts of the horn,
which belonged to each detail of the field; to track the hunted
ani